


A Boy Is A Bullet

by lavenderlilypad



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Best Friends, Bottom Harry, Coming of Age, Dorks in Love, Explicit Sexual Content, First Kiss, Football | Soccer, Friends to Lovers, Graduation, High School, Loss of Virginity, M/M, POV Alternating, POV Harry, POV Louis Tomlinson, Post-Graduation, Teenagers, they are right at the end of it and just about to graduate tho
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-22
Updated: 2021-03-10
Packaged: 2021-03-12 08:55:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 79,622
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29632191
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lavenderlilypad/pseuds/lavenderlilypad
Summary: “I’m gonna miss this thing. For real,” Harry says thoughtfully, still pretty much gazing at the closed locker.Louis looks up at him and barely raises an eyebrow. “A… a big chunk of metal.”Harry blinks fiercely as he moves his eyes to focus on Louis in front of him, as though the boy is crazy. “A chunk of—Louis, this is ourlocker. It’s been our locker since freshman year and it’s the only locker in the school that’sthisbig. Things like that don’t happen often.”With the approach of high school graduation, harrowing final exams, and surprise drunken kisses, dysfunctional best friends Harry and Louis have a lot to figure out in such little time.
Relationships: Harry Styles/Louis Tomlinson
Comments: 18
Kudos: 48





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> freshman - first year of high school  
> sophomore - second year of high school  
> junior - third year of high school  
> senior - fourth and last year of high school
> 
> they are eighteen. this is also a repost. enjoy perhaps

“Oh shit,” Harry breathes.

He’s hardly even gotten his own words out before he’s dropping the nearly empty bottle of blue dye into the pool and scrambling to his feet as fast as he can possibly manage. He almost trips over his feet in such a way that he definitely would’ve busted his nose had he not caught himself in time, but he doesn’t linger on that narrowly missed reality as he’s sprinting along the edge of the pool and towards the exit door of the school recreation center, every shout of his name and threat to kick his ass from the group of boys behind him only encouraging him to pump his fists even faster.

After practically bruising his shoulders shoving himself through the double door exit, he’s pushing his way through the many moving bodies of students flooding the hallways, which makes sense, because the bell had just rung to signify the end of the school day. Right before Harry got caught.

He’d been having a _perfect_ streak this whole school year. At least four different times now, he’s managed to inconspicuously pour blue dye into the school swimming pool before the swim team had practice for the day, and _every time_ he’d gotten away with it. He’d had a very thorough pattern; he’d pour it in after excusing himself to the bathroom during his last period, they’d have practice thirty minutes later, come out of the pool with periwinkle-colored skin on their bodies and faces (that’s really hard to wash out—he’d tested it on himself first), they’d grow furious wondering who’d done it, try to come to practice early to catch the culprit, and Harry wouldn’t do it again—that was, until the _very_ day they decided the person wasn’t going to do it again and stopped coming early to keep a close eye. He’d gotten away with this system _four times_.

Obviously, his luck has ran out by now, which is why he’s hustling his way through the filled, noisy hallways, disregarding the fact that one of his shoes have become untied. He just about rams himself into a corner trying to turn into the hallway where his locker is, getting pretty colorfully cursed at by some girl who gets a textbook knocked out of her grip as a result of his actions, but he can’t focus on that—because he can still _hear_ their feet. About five or six of them, still charging after him through the school grounds like an angry bull herd.

He spots Louis in the distance by their locker way before he reaches it, and the boy is leaned back against the surface of the lockers, playing with his phone in his hand and tapping at it—he only glances up and finds Harry approaching for half a second, before training his eyes back upon his device and using his free hand in order to lazily open their locker.

Louis’ eyes don’t even come up to meet his as he continues poking at his—well, it’s not his phone but his _calculator,_ now that Harry has a closer look—as though he’s texting, voice disinterested and eyes lidded whilst his free hand still holds the locker open for him. “God, you can’t go a day without anyone wanting to kick your ass, can you?”

“ _Thank_ you,” Harry pretty much pants before he fully throws himself into it, Louis closing it behind him. Judging by the movement Harry can sense while nearly quivering in the dark, crowded space, the boy moves to lean his back against it.

He can’t even take the time to be astronomically thankful of how huge this locker is, even as he _is_ hunching his back and pressing his shoulders on either side in order to fit. He can’t acknowledge the gratefulness because only two seconds later he can hear them approaching Louis, and he feels like even his thoughts might be too loud and give him away.

“Where’s your _buddy_?” one of them, most likely the swim team captain, sneers at Louis.

Harry can only see what the single cut sliver in the locker allows him to, which is hardly anything, but there can definitely be a vague crowd of agile, limber guys in red school jerseys understood to be on the other side. As he does in all situations however, Louis keeps his composure, Harry even still hearing him tapping at his calculator.

“I’m sorry who?”

Harry rolls his eyes, somehow managing to swallow the lump in his throat at the same time.

“ _Harry_.”

“Haven’t seen him all day,” Louis begins, Harry merely sensing the way he shrugs his right shoulder alone, as he always does when he lies. “Actually forgot he existed until this very moment, if I’m being honest.”

Harry strains his chest and shoulders as subtly as possible, trying to get any kind of breathing space within this damn metal thing, not even giving his energy to the fact that he’s fucking up his own textbooks with how much he’s shifting his feet to get comfortable. The storage racks are digging into his backpack and suddenly he isn’t grateful for this damn locker at all. It’s practically an upright tomb.

The fact that the anger seems to die down on the other side of the locker soothes him a bit as he listens to their retreating footsteps—although his shoulders do jump a bit when one of them seems to punch the lockers nearby while they're making their way off to continue their journey of hunting him down.

A considerable amount of time goes by before the locker’s being opened by Louis and Harry’s stepping out of it with a humongous breath of both relief and fresh air.

“Forgot I _existed_?” Harry asks, making incredulous eyes at Louis as he’s adjusting his backpack upon his shoulders more properly. “That’s a bit of overkill, don’t you think?”

Louis holds his calculator out in front of Harry’s face, his lips quirking upward just barely on one side (which is a lot coming from Louis) as he ignores his offense. “Look. I made it say _testicles.”_

Harry nods as he looks down at the high-tech calculator shoved in his face that indeed has the word “testicles” displayed on the screen in perfect letters. “Yes, very fascinating. Modern calculators can type out all kinds of things now besides _hello_ and _boobies_. Who knew?”

Louis’ shrugging him off as he’s moving to take his (practically empty) backpack off of the hook in their locker and pocketing his calculator. “Don’t be a smart ass. I didn’t have to save you.”

“Don’t be a dumb ass,” Harry retorts, crossing his arms as he leans against the nearby lockers, head rested against the surface as he watches Louis search his backpack for his keys. “I would’ve found a way on my own.”

Louis looks at him with bored eyes as he takes a break from scouring through his bag, and all Harry offers him in response is a smug raise of his eyebrows, because it’s true. He doesn’t _completely_ rely on Louis to get him out of predicaments all the time; he’d survived on this great green earth before him, thank you very much.

“You’re lucky this thing is nearly empty otherwise you would’ve had nowhere to hide,” Louis replies, moving to shut the locker.

“Yes, I’m definitely going to thank you for never having any idea where your textbooks are and thus, never having them in there.”

There’s definitely a fight just beginning to break out a little further down the hallway behind Louis’ head, and despite the very evident increase of volume and revelry, as well as a few people literally shoving Harry in order to advance toward it for a better view, Louis doesn’t even stir, just instead working in order to get the lock on their locker back in place and mumbling a “god, shut up”.

Harry shifts his eyes away from the mere act of Louis securing the lock, and to the actual locker, tilting his head in fascination as he just kinda looks at it—with all its scratches from that time Harry’d forgotten the combination and used a knife to open it, smudged permanent marker from when they’d written their names on it and were forced to clean it as best they could (Harry got detention for that—he still doesn’t know how Louis got off the hook), weird sticky stains towards the top of it that honestly, neither of them know the origin of. It probably just had to do with some randos loitering by their locker and eating candy, not being respectful of the fact that they were standing next to a literal historical monument of their high school.

Harry pretty much continues to blink at the thing as Louis’ clasping hands with and nodding at people who engage with him as they walk by.

“I’m gonna miss this thing. For real,” Harry says thoughtfully, still pretty much gazing at the closed locker.

Louis looks up at him and barely raises an eyebrow. “A… a big chunk of metal.”

Harry blinks fiercely as he moves his eyes to focus on Louis in front of him, as though the boy is crazy. “A chunk of—Louis, this is our _locker_. It’s been our locker since freshman year and it’s the only locker in the school that’s _this_ big. Things like that don’t happen often.”

It actually was supposed to be assigned to Micky Foster, who'd failed to utilize it for many weeks well into freshman year. No one had knowledge of that though, besides Louis and Harry who'd been watching the lucky locker closely and waiting for the perfect moment to pounce on it and share it for themselves. The boy it technically belongs to has always been kind of a slacker (notoriously since junior high), often opting to be rebellious and rarely ever attending school regularly anyway, so Louis and Harry had been the only ones smart enough to use that to their advantage as early as they could. They were in their _prime._ If Micky Foster ever discovers he actually has a huge, luxury locker here and that it’s been hijacked for years, Harry doesn't even want to imagine what kind of repercussion they would face.

“Whatever you say,” Louis replies halfheartedly, a hidden smirk on his face as though he finds Harry’s sentimentality ridiculously amusing or something. He adjusts his bag where it’s hanging off of one shoulder and begins his way past Harry, patting his arm on the way by and uttering a “see you later sappy.”

“Wait—wait.” Harry’s quick to turn around and follow the boy where he’s headed toward the exit of the building, his stride not hindering in rhythm or speed as Harry catches up to him. “We’re not carpooling?”

Louis’ scrolling through his phone halfheartedly as he’s approaching one of the many double door exits towards the lobby, only giving Harry half of his attention as Harry stares at the side of his face with disbelief. “Oh—oh yeah, I. Kinda have a special passenger today,” he says, taking his sunglasses out of his tousled hair and sliding them down over his eyes.

A noiseless groan leaves Harry’s mouth as he pushes through the exit after Louis, already knowing exactly what that means and moving to cross his arms over his chest. “Really. You couldn’t have told me that before letting me ride with you this morning.” Despite him standing in the same place near the front entrance of the school and Louis continuing to drag his feet toward the front stairs, he keeps his volume at the same decibel and his eyes just as tired and over this.

Louis makes a casual twirl right before he reaches the steps, shrugging his shoulders in a _my bad_ sort of manner.

And then Harry’s just left with the sunlit student body moving in between them, and a vague view of Louis lazily skipping his way down the steps, finding Leah at the bottom of them giggling with her friends in their usual spot, and smoothly stretching his arm around her back as she begins to allow him to lead the way to his car without a thought. 

“As always,” Harry shrugs to himself, resisting the urge to roll his eyes. “Boobs rank higher than me.”

He hadn’t thought he’d been voicing his inner thoughts that loud, but when few people striding past and lingering around make questioning faces at him, he realizes he’d definitely been a little more outspoken than he’d needed to be. Who cares anyway. 

He can’t believe they’re still a thing. Definitely one of Louis’ longer lasting endeavors.

It’s almost like it’s heaven sent, when Niall exits the building at exactly that moment and is beelining toward the front steps without even as much as a glance in Harry’s direction. Harry catches him by the shoulder and calls his name before he can get away however, Niall’s eyebrows shooting up in surprise as he meets his eyes behind those thickly rimmed eyeglasses he’s been sporting as long as Harry’s known him.

“What?” Niall asks with annoyance, mirroring Louis in not pausing his steps as they both continue to start down the stairs that decorate the front entrance of the high school.

“Carpool,” Harry says simply, knowing it won’t take much for the boy to understand.

“What happened to your best pal Louis?” he asks, digging his keys out of his pocket as they continue to walk.

Harry taps at the boy’s arms with both hands in a way that he knows is irritating, even raising his voice to that whiny pitch. “He’s fooling around with Leah just please, _please_ I don’t feel like taking the bus, _c’mon_.”

“Some best friend he is,” Niall mutters, which Harry pretty much takes as a yes as his grin grows and he hops on the balls of his feet just a little as they make their way towards the senior parking lot.

Niall’s in the middle of telling Harry that because he’s doing him this favor, for their next test in art class Harry better actually study for it and not even think about glancing at his paper for answers, and Harry does his best to nod his head in agreement (despite not planning to actually honor this agreement at all) when the breath gets knocked out of him by beefy hands shoving him in a relentless push.

He’s not surprised to be on the grass with just a slight twinge of pain in his right arm as he pushes himself to his elbows, not surprised to see the same crowd of displeased, irate swim team members in their stupid droopy red jerseys and sweatbands, looming over him. God, the mere fact that they feel they have some kind of upper hand over anyone by being on the swim team keeps Harry feeling more than gratified that he'd fucked with their egos so much. No one even knows who the swim team is. If they’d had even half the influence that the basketball and soccer teams have Harry would’ve gotten caught way before now.

“Found you,” one of them says with just enough of an evil air to his tone to get Harry to feel just a hint of absolute fear.

“Hey— _hey_ , guys,” Harry stammers, putting his hands up as he remains on the ground. “I really am sorry, truly, it was just a harmless prank—“

“What’s the problem?”

Harry has no idea of why he’d forgotten about Niall’s presence until there he is, stepping in front of a ground ridden Harry and forming the barrier between him and these tall hovering swimmers.

“The _problem_ is, your friend’s been fucking with us for the entire year, and we’re finally gonna beat his ass.”

Harry swallows and continues to remain pliable and spineless on the ground behind Niall.

“I don’t think so,” Niall replies simply. He’s always had all the same calm quiet demeanor as Louis, the main difference between them being that he's much more booksmart. Louis is a dumbass.

“And why not?”

And then, Niall’s reaching into the side pocket of his backpack, and it takes only a split second for everyone to realize he’s pulling out a taser, declaring to the pack of boys that his “dad’s a cop” as he clicks it at them and succeeds in getting them to disperse, even though they curse and grunt about how this “isn’t worth it” as they depart.

Harry’s filled with thankfulness as Niall’s pulling him to his feet, his eyes absolutely glimmering at the boy and his knees very close to buckling with joy. “God, can’t believe that threat still works!”

“Yeah, yeah, just c’mon,” Niall says exhaustedly as they begin to traverse upon the student parking lot. “And try to stop pissing people off sometimes.”

Harry slumps his shoulders as he continues next to Niall because—and he’s had to iterate this many times—he had a good reason for doing the pranks! Well, at first. But after the thrill and gratification of the first time he just truly couldn’t stop. It’s the _swimming team_ that is the enemy here.

It doesn’t surprise him when they’re stumbling past Louis’ parked car as they traverse over the groveled rocks to get to their designated vehicle, Louis clearly already having started his festivities with Leah as she caresses his face and seems to be—let’s just say she’s whispering a secret in his ear. Let’s keep it family friendly for now.

He barely catches the eye of Louis as they're making their way past, Leah buried in his neck and Louis taking full notice of the fact that Harry makes an act of gagging, finger pointed down his throat and all. All Louis does in response is give Harry the finger, which delights Harry greatly, because it’s a simple indicator that things between them are normal as usual.

The car ride home is okay—well, as okay as it can be when riding with someone who’s very uptight about car safety and doesn’t even turn on music out of fear of being distracted. Harry loves Niall very much though. Definitely wouldn’t have been able to get through an entire school year of art class without him.

It’s pleasant to find his mom behind the kitchen sink once he slides through the front door of his home, yellow rubber gloves covered upon her hands as she works to wash dishes while also watching her usual evening talk show as much as she can see the living room from where she is.

He wastes no time striding up to her in order to press a kiss into her cheek in greeting as she inquires about how his day was.

“You know, it’d be helpful if you washed these sometimes,” she says once Harry is surveying the pantry with his narrowed eyes after relaying his uneventful school day to her (only uneventful because he left out the part where he almost got jumped in the school front yard).

“Mom, I’m not even gonna be around here much longer,” Harry replies, right before settling on snatching the box of cinnamon cereal from the bottom rack and deciding it’ll do. “Wouldn’t you wanna prepare yourself for that as early as possible?” he asks through a full mouth, just having gotten done stuffing a hand of cereal into his mouth.

“Please don’t go to school to become a lawyer. Your argument skills are terrible,” she says over her shoulder as Harry is already giggling, little crumbs falling from his loaded mouth as he strides toward the stairs. 

“Wasn’t planning on it,” is probably the last thing she can hear from him before he’s prancing up the stairs, skipping every other step and wholly preparing to actually, genuinely do his _homework_ tonight. It’s been a long time since he’s done his homework and he honestly feels like today might be the day he commits to his daily vow that he will do it this time.

Those plans somehow get delayed when he finds himself laid on his back upon his bed, sucked into the contents of his phone with his backpack still discarded near his open bedroom door. He _is_ still going to do his homework, however. He’d promised himself.

He glances at the time on his phone briefly, discovering that it’s 7:02.

Well, that just means he should start his homework at 7:30. It only makes sense.

The entertainment on his screen acquires just a bit more of his attention when he gets a notification that someone’s liked one of his pictures, which is odd considering he barely even uses that dumb app and posts like two pictures a decade, one of them being a lucky piece of toast that looked like it had a perfectly shaded Iron Man on it, and the other one being an ironic prehistoric cat meme. What intrigues him even more so about the notification is that it appears to come from one of the guys at his school, one that he vaguely remembers had transferred out of his woodshop class a while ago, which is…interesting.

Interesting because Harry’s probably only spoken three words to this guy, which likely consisted of “pass the screwdriver”. He’d always thought he was cute though. Ezra, Harry believes his name is.

He doesn’t dwell on the meaning or meaninglessness of it though, because he never really allows himself to get hung up on his complete and utter lack of a love life. It’s useless, and he’s pretty sure boys can sense when he’s a hopeless romantic and thus get scared away. That’s why he has to shield himself, like a spy, being this super fun and charismatic cool guy on the outside but being a despairing, wine drinking (in theory) individual with a longing for even one boyfriend on the inside. So yeah, a spy. Besides the super cool ass kicking and stuff.

He doesn’t even realize it when he’s rolling over on his side within his bed, his head half-buried in his arm as he continues to scroll through his phone for as long as his heavy eyes will allow him.

Homework is the last thing on his mind when he’s actually slipping his eyes shut and letting his hand go limp around his phone, giving less than a fuck about the contacts still in his eyes (although he knows he will give a lot more than a fuck later). He’s pretty sure his body is just used to the fact that this is how most of his days go. It’s hard to break a habit that one's own _body_ is literally dead set on.

The next time he opens his eyes to slits is because there’s the apparent sound of someone else in his room, which would alarm literally any other person, except Harry knows it’s Louis. All he sees as he barely tugs his eyes open and snuggles his head more deeply into his arms is the pitch black darkness of his room, and only for a few seconds does his mind linger on what time it may be.

“Do you have to take up most of the damn bed?” Louis grumbles, followed by the feeling of him shoving Harry out of the way—so much that Harry falls right out of the bed.

Harry’s pretty sure he’s got a sprained nose as he finds himself face down on the rugged carpet, but he’s so tired and limp that all he can do is groan deeply whilst listening to the sound of Louis presumably getting himself comfortable under the sheets.

He hates to admit that this is also normal.

It isn’t much longer before he’s finding comfort in the ground however, giving into the deep sleep that his body desires.

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

“No. No,” Harry argues, speaking over Louis as they make their way towards his driveway. He uses his forearm to shield his face from the absolutely blinding sun, a truly relentless orb that always decides to torture him in the early morning before school. “You just get in your car and I’ll get in mine—“

“That doesn’t make any sense,” Louis replies, backpack still hung off of one shoulder in its usual way as he walks backwards toward where his car is parked on the curb, facing Harry. Sometimes Harry wonders if the world will collapse if the boy ever wears both straps on his shoulders. “Why would we do that when we’re both going to the same place—“

“Because you’re gonna leave me stranded at school for some chick and I’m gonna have to hitch a ride again.”

Louis pauses his backwards movements, letting his shoulders down and making an exhausted face at Harry. He probably rolls his eyes too, but Harry can’t see it through the sunglasses Louis’ so keen on wearing that make him look like he’s literally having a hangover every day.

“Do I look like some hitchhiker, Louis? Do these look like hitchhiker thumbs to you?” Harry asks, holding his thumbs up as Louis continues to cock his head at him boredly. “ _Do_ they?”

Louis smacks Harry’s thumbs down and out of his face with a disgruntled moan, before working to fish his keys out of his pocket. “I won’t do that this time. Just c’mon.”

Harry shakes his head at himself as he approaches the car and prepares to round it in order to get in on the passenger side. If Louis ditches him again today _he’s_ getting dye in his shampoo. For real this time.

“Breakfast first,” Louis says as soon as they’re both situated inside and he’s twisting his key in the ignition.

 _Why_ must Louis always tempt him when he’s trying to get his life together?

“I have a test in first period, and we’re already late,” Harry counters, Louis chuckling lazily before he’s even finished his sentence.

“So…”

“So I can’t be late to school for a French toast stick, idiot,” Harry replies.

“Dude, there’s like, barely any days left in your high school career,” Louis replies as he coasts through the neighborhood, leaned back in his seat considerably far. “What could this test possibly do to you?”

Harry sighs as he leans his head back against the cushion, because a French toast stick _does_ sound kind of good right now. “I dunno…” He catches himself before he can sink too deep into just blindly agreeing with the boy as per usual, sitting up rapidly. “Wait no— _no_ , you’ve used that argument like, five times in the past month. These things add up—both on my grades _and_ my thighs.”

“Jesus, shut _up_ about your thighs,” Louis whines, throwing his head back as he accelerates. “For just one day, please, I need my appetite.”

Harry puts his hands up mock defensively. “Sorry that as a gay man I _care_ about keeping up my appearance. Thighs are really important to us, you know.”

“Well, I would see how that would matter if you were getting any action, but you’re not,” Louis replies, a slight smirk to his lips as Harry stares offendedly at the profile of the boy’s face, as well as his usually mussed hair (he’d _literally_ done nothing to it after rolling out of Harry’s bed this morning). “Like, at all. Absolutely none.”

“And how exactly would you know that?”

“Because I just know.”

“ _Wow_ , very good reasoning. You should become a sex expert, or something.”

This is a quarrel that pretty much continues for the full fifteen minutes it takes to get to school, which is convenient because their school is on the way to the breakfast diner Louis is always in favor of going to.

The squabble ends with Louis pulling up to the curb of the school and telling Harry to “get out and take your stupid test then”, and Harry being proud of himself and the fact that he’d actually _not_ given into Louis’ tempting breakfast treats for once.

“Gladly,” Harry replies, shoving himself out of the car.

He mumbles something before Harry can shut the door behind himself though, which prompts Harry to duck his head back inside the car and offer him a “hmm?”

“Potential last match of the year later on today. Just a reminder.”

To be utterly honest, Harry probably would’ve forgotten all about that soccer match if Louis hadn’t reminded him just now. There’s just been a lot going on, what with the school year coming to a close and college deadlines up to his chest, endless student events intended for cherishing moments with his graduating class, and the pressure and obligations of his nonexistent love life. He can’t be the superior half of the best friendship all the time; it's too much work for one person.

“Of course—definitely,” Harry replies, gripping the door frame as he sees a few of Louis’ teammates appearing to be making their approach towards his car. “I’ll be there, booing you enthusiastically.”

Louis presumably rolls his eyes behind his glasses, shaking his head dismissively and continuing to grip the steering wheel. “Just go.”

“Love you,” is the last thing Harry says before he shuts the door, Louis fittingly replying with a “yeah, okay”.

Harry doesn’t even get to turn around before the guys on Louis’ soccer team are right behind him, barely greeting Harry as they make their way past him like a gust of wind. They open Louis’ car door right back up, being the typical rowdy jocks that they are and shaking his vehicle, inquiring about where he’s going. The team’s captain, Liam, is a little less subtle about not caring about Harry’s presence though, the guy fully shoving Harry’s shoulder on the way past as they all declare that they’d _definitely_ be down for ditching the first few periods to get some breakfast. 

Hmmm. Liam. That’s an aspect of high school he surely won’t miss.

Zayn’s the only one that properly acknowledges him directly—well, if calling him Henry and offering him a shake of the shoulder counts. At least he’s trying though—it’s just comforting knowing that it's not because he's malicious, or belligerent, he's just clueless, eager-to-please-because-he's-one-grade-under-everyone Zayn Malik. The Beautiful Zayn Malik, actually, but Harry won't get carried away on those hopeless aspirations that lived and died last semester.

Harry shrugs all of it off as he makes his way toward the front stairs that lead to the entrance, already troubled by the fact that it’s five minutes until first period starts. He can hear Louis’ car veering off far in the distance behind him, probably now packed with various members of the soccer team getting ready to cause a ruckus in an innocent breakfast diner.

He’s sprinting up the stairs with his wristwatch to his face when the sudden call of his name brings his movements to a halt.

It’s kind of like a slow, suspenseful moment, the way his hand lowers from his face and his gaze moves to the right to fall upon that same group of boys, situated near the railing of the stairs with the shared look in their eyes that they’d worn when they’d caught him yesterday. 

Well, this is just dandy.


	2. Chapter 2

Louis’ so invested in squinting his eyes toward the stands that he almost misses it when Liam is passing the ball to him with a harsh kick from the side of his foot that sends the ball soaring over, Louis catching it just in time and seamlessly switching straight into game mode as he goes flying down the field.

This could very well be their last match of the year, unless they win against these purple-clothed suckers (which would be a first), so it’s a pretty big deal. Which means Louis definitely shouldn’t be letting the absence of some nerd in the bleachers distract him from the very important match that’s going on right now.

Although Louis’ feet are mighty quick and his eyes are intensely focused on every movement of every limb on his body in order to stay well-coordinated right now, currently headed straight for the goal and disregarding the thought of passing to anyone else as he sees a clear opportunity in sight, Louis still isn’t mentally putting all of his hopes and dreams into this match. Despite what it might seem like, he’s actually sort of playing for fun, really.

Is there really any pressure to be had when he’s having his last hurrah on the field and just wants to be able to have one more decent match surrounded by the teammates he’s grown to call friends? The opposing team isn’t even a big rival one; Louis will not put his emotions into this match.

It’s almost as though every muscle and bone in his body is working on autopilot, because without really thinking, he finds himself panting against the dampness of the grass after having put his all into the final kick that sent the soccer ball soaring right past the goalkeeper and into the net. He’s hardly even reactive to the sudden roar emerging from the stands where their team’s school fans and families reside, only turning his eyes toward the bleachers as he pushes himself up from his elbows.

Still no loser boy.

Louis decides to shrug it off as he continues through the match that begins to get almost irritatingly close in competition, focusing on not letting his team down by purposely slacking right before the season ends.

The praise and pure abundance of the crowd in the stands is enough to power Louis through halftime even though it remains in the back of his mind that he _had_ made a point to literally remind the boy this morning.

It also helps that right before the team breaks to get in their positions for the second half of the match, Coach grabs a hold of Louis by the neck of his jersey, basically taking just a few extra moments to let Louis know how rewarding his four years of being his coach have been, things about how he has a “bright future” and he’s “especially talented”, and Louis takes all of it in with a few nods, digesting it thoroughly although not falling to emotional crumbles like Coach probably wants him to. It’s been four years, Coach should know by now that Louis isn’t a sap.

The match is back into full gear once Louis is once again out on the field, now definitely in a much more elevated mood as he even takes the time to braggingly juggle the soccer ball between both of his thighs once it gets passed to him, right before kicking it to Jordan.

It’s pretty much understood to everyone on the team that Louis hates being yelled at on the field and especially while he has the ball, but that hasn’t ever really stopped Liam from doing it anyway, the boy giving him hints on where to go and who to look out for and “what the _fuck_ are you doing” and even sometimes screaming unintelligibly every time Louis even barely grazes the ball. As much as Louis’ claimed to hate it in general, he thinks his body has naturally adapted to it from Liam to a point where it isn’t even wildly distracting anymore.

Liam has always had a liking for doing exactly what he wants—quite aggressively, too. It’s something Louis has never had to get used to, seeing as he’s known the guy since they were young enough to fit on the baby swings in playgrounds, and he’s quite warmed up to any characteristic the boy puts out, like that of a brother. The stoic stubbornness of Liam Payne has always been kind of admirable, though, because Louis is almost the same, except in a time where he would cave himself, Liam still wouldn’t. It makes Louis proud to have him as one of his best friends sometimes, especially since his hardheadedness resulted in new uniforms for this last soccer season.

Louis had been voted as team captain at the beginning of the school year, but due to both not wanting to be in a position of power and also feeling someone else could better lead, he turned it down, and he couldn’t have even imagined a more fitting captain than the incomparable Liam Payne. The position’s gotten him a lot of clout this year—he’s even got a soccer scholarship nice and ready for him at the dream school he always used to blab to Louis about, so all is going quite smoothly for him.

Louis is perfectly fine accepting this—this very match, watching his feet hit the grass and falling against the mud and all—as his very last soccer rodeo. He absolutely loves the sport without a doubt, and everyone knows how sparingly he admits to “loving” anything, but he’d actually prefer to explore something else past high school, whether it be in college, or with whatever else he decides to pursue in life. Doesn’t want to feel tied down to anything. Going with whatever flow sweeps him away has always been his thing.

Louis’ in the midst of a decoy run on the field just after Jordan has stolen the ball from the opposing team, which has caused the crowd in the bleachers to erupt some more, obviously still contained with optimism that they could win this one, and thus, not mark the end of the season just yet.

Somehow, the towering white lights that frame the field are even more blinding than usual as Louis takes the time to glance toward the stands again—this time, obviously now that he’s shrugged it off entirely, finding a particularly tall, curly haired bloke in the stands, only noticeable because of the giant sign that he’s holding up enthusiastically, which reads “DWEEB” in big, red painted letters against a white poster. The boy made a good effort to match the school’s color scheme, at least.

Louis’ eyes wander slightly downward from the sign and towards the boy who’s waving it around in the air with straight, energetic arms, his own feet already shuffling backwards in response to the shout of his name somewhere behind him on the field.

Harry has the toothiest smile upon his face while Louis mimes the act of choking himself in response, right before running off and away towards the action of the field where the rest of his teammates are dispersed so he can maneuver his best in order to win tonight.

Louis feels a little lighter moving forward, which is odd since a bit of rain starts to come down, and as the match nears its end, the possibility of their team winning starts to seem less promising—especially once the other team scores an amazing goal when there’s hardly any time left. Somehow though, Louis begins to feel a bit of pressure lift off of him, even more so when during another tiny moment to breathe that Louis is granted, a coily-haired old flame that he hasn’t spoken to in weeks decides to give him a little wave from the stands, stifling a grin into one of her friends’ shoulders when Louis offers her a subtle wink in return. She was a lot of fun, honestly. He has no idea why that fizzled out. And it's perfectly convenient too, since Louis' last interaction with _Leah_ may or may not have ended with a cup of water being splashed in his face. Something about Louis forgetting her birthday—but honestly, Louis barely even remembers his _own_ , so. Either way, it's left a spot wide open, which is fun.

The match ends in a loss, 2-1, but it doesn’t seem to disappoint the energy of their school supporters once everyone is departing to leave, however, because still, this is the last match, and the whole school has always been quite fond of the senior players and are emotional to see them leave.

This is why Louis, along with Liam, Jordan, Damien, Miles, and Michael, are on the receiving ends of long, emphatic speeches in the locker room after the match, followed by even _more_ long, emphatic speeches and memories as they leave the locker room and are back out on the field, followed by impromptu roughhousing as the rest of the team seemed to have pre-planned an ambush for the senior boys. It results in Louis getting thoroughly shoved into the mud and held in many chokeholds as his teammates tackle him to the wet grass—nothing Louis hasn’t experienced before. He’s actually always loved a bit of roughhousing.

One of the juniors that isn’t graduating until next year, Zayn, had planned a little get-together (party) at his place after this match in the event of them winning, but right now, with energy still pulsing through everyone, spirits high and mighty, and celebration continuing, Louis’ pretty sure it’s still happening tonight.

Louis’ muddy in his cheeks, bare arms, and upon a few snags in his jersey once he’s finally making his exit from the field with the rest of the team and moving towards the expansive parking lot right outside of it where most of everyone still resides. Immediately upon witnessing the team’s arrival, there’s even more cheer—Louis even bringing his shoulders up to his ears in reaction to what sounds like someone blowing a kazoo.

Yep, the party’s definitely still on.

Louis participates in many high fives and finds himself pulled into countless enthused conversations as the sports bag that he has hanging off of his right shoulder, containing his warm-up outfit, personal soccer ball, regular shoes, and one of his textbooks, begins to put just a bit of a strain on him.

He somehow snakes his way to Jas (past romantic endeavor that waved at him earlier) at some point within the general mingle and mixture of everything, trying his hand at starting back up where they’d left off and doing the classic (and maybe douchey) practice of pretending he doesn’t know what happened between them, even though he _does_ know that he, himself, becoming unresponsive was a part of the reason. He’s a guy, okay.

In the midst of offering his halfhearted, tiny grins at the curly brunette in front of him and using the noise of the people in the parking lot as an excuse to lean in closer by his ear and caress her waist, Louis’ eyes find Harry, kind of far off and to the side. Louis’ first thought has to do with the fact that he’d definitely thought the boy would’ve left by now. Like, by now Louis had spent practically an hour having quality time with his team in the locker room, and now everyone’s about to go to Zayn’s party, and that has never been something that Harry’s into.

He appears to have his obnoxious, giant sign tucked under his armpit as he’s conversing with some guy Louis has probably seen a few times or less while walking the hallways of his school. That still doesn’t explain why Harry is speaking to him though, seeing as Louis knows Harry and Harry isn’t close friends with much of anybody.

Louis pulls his eyes away, however, and makes a maneuver of getting Jas' phone number into his phone because it’s changed since they’d last been involved, and she’s parting ways from him with blushed cheeks and a pseudo-casual “text me” before she’s prancing away to join her friends once again.

Louis pretty much stands in place after that, still holding his phone in his hand and trying not to acknowledge the slightly overwhelming energy he’s beginning to feel as a result of many people still occupying the parking lot, blowing kazoos, patting him on his shoulder roughly as they pass by, and hollering loudly. 

He pockets his phone in his jersey shorts as he brings his lazy gaze back up to where Harry’d been, finding the boy _still_ engaged in conversation with Random Guy. The boy is honestly contributing to Louis’ current overwhelmed state, he should know. Louis can almost hear him talking about his current Netflix binge from here.

Louis proceeds to display a pretty obvious disregard for their conversation, seeing as they’ve probably already said all they needed to say and are now just doing that awkward rambling thing that people do when they like each other (Harry is _especially_ horrendous with it—Louis’ been a firsthand witness only once or twice before).

“Haz,” Louis says, his voice monotone but still high enough in volume for Harry to briefly flick his gaze towards the boy as he itches behind his ear.

It appears he’s trying to continue his conversation, instead of immediately giving into Louis’ beck and call. That just won’t do.

“Haz,” Louis calls again, using that same bored tone, although definitely being heard a little above everyone else. “Haz. Haz.” He can honestly do this all day.

He can hear Harry muttering a sincere and giggly “sorry” to the guy, and then, from Louis’ distance of hearing, what seems like a bunch of awkward “catch you later” type of stuff ensues, all the while Louis has probably uttered the boy’s name twice more.

“What, _what?”_ Harry asks, his face literally having snapped from blushed and smitten to stern and irate within seconds of parting ways with the boy and stalking over to Louis. He speaks in a hushed, urgent fashion whilst Louis remains tired in the eyes, sore at his feet, and with his jersey sticking to him in uncanny places. 

“That guy was _asking me out_ , you know,” Harry says, grabbing one of Louis’ arms firmly, and seeming as though he doesn’t know if he’s still irritated at Louis or ready to burst with contained joy. Still, the sharp lowness of his voice is a little difficult to discern from the rest of the hubbub of people loitering outside of the field and raving on about how great of a year it was despite the loss and where the next move for the night will be. 

“Asking _me_ out!” is what Louis hears over the general noise, Harry finally deciding on bursting with joy as his eyes gleam and he reaches for his own curls. “I really have a _date_ this weekend. Like…I can’t even—how did that _happen_?”

“He obviously hasn’t seen your drama club costumes,” Louis replies lowly without missing a beat, Harry already deflating as his hands drop to his sides.

“Now was that necessary?”

“Was you missing the entire first half of my match necessary?”

The boy’s face shows a speck of guilt in response, Louis taking notice of his little collar peeking out from underneath the giant windbreaker he has on (in almost eighty degree weather). “Sorry about that,” the boy says. “Had to take my test after school.”

“I thought you said it was in first period.”

“Yeah, that was _before_ the swimming team caught up to me first thing in the morning.” 

Louis’ only allowed two seconds of somewhat puzzlement before Harry’s rolling up his windbreaker, exposing the slightly wrinkled, untucked sky blue collared shirt he has on underneath (Louis’ always been…intrigued by the boy’s tendency to dress in sort of a preppy, yet unkempt way…it’s interesting) and coming all the way up to the top of his chest to reveal—the boy’s got giant holes cut out of his shirt. Right over both nipples. They’re bare. Probably cold.

Louis’ smacking his hand over his own mouth before Harry’s even hurriedly pushing his windbreaker back down, not knowing whether to laugh, or ask Harry if he’s okay (because that’s seriously always been his favorite shirt, he’s had it since two summers ago), or what.

“I had absolutely _nothing_ else to change into,” Harry continues, looking down with a bit of shame and adjusting the sign under his armpit just a bit. “My mom didn’t bring me this“—he grabs a hold of the material of his outer layer—"until _fourth period_.”

“Well…” Louis begins, scratching his chin thoughtfully and struggling to control the quivering of his closed lips. “It could’ve been much worse, really. They could’ve kicked you in the face.”

“Yeah, I realize that,” Harry replies matter-of-factly. “Instead they took the _Mean Girls_ route, which is fitting for them.”

“Harry.” Louis tilts his head at the boy in that way he pretty much reserves specifically for him, in order to get any sort of point across to the boy. “You can’t terrorize the hues of people’s bodies for months and then call _them_ the mean girls.”

Louis puts a hand up just as Harry’s sucking in air in order to vehemently defend himself, Louis already having an idea of what he’s going to bring up. “And the homophobia card doesn’t work here.”

“ _Louis_ ,” Harry whines, his brows creasing and Louis knowing he’s getting ready to give his reasoning behind doing his pranks for the hundredth time. “They came to the school’s play of _MacBeth_. They threw things at me on stage. They made fart noises every time I had a line. If that’s not homophobia, I don’t know what is, and honestly, I think this is an issue you should take more seriously.”

“It’s because you were wearing _tights_ ,” Louis replies, already giggling at himself towards the end of the sentence as his feet shuffle backwards, already having minds of their own and headed towards his car. “Now come on.” He kind of just expects Harry to be following behind him as he’s dragging his feet across the pavement and maneuvering through bodies, and it seems that’s exactly what happens as he hears Harry’s voice not too far behind him.

“Come on where?”

“To my car. So we can go to your house. Duh,” Louis replies monotonously, turning around and walking backwards with a bit of a skip as he faces the boy.

“Isn’t that thing still happening at Zayn’s place?”

Louis purses his lips a bit and twists his face up, searching his right shorts pocket for his keys as they’re nearing his car and becoming significantly further away from the general chaos of the audience in the parking lot. “Yeah, but I’m kinda worn out for today. Not feelin’ the party stuff.”

A hum is the most that comes out of Harry’s mouth once Louis has his keys out of his pocket and is giving them a quick toss into the air as he rounds his sedan and heads for the driver’s seat.

“Anne working tonight?”

“Yes but—“

“Awesome. We can drink up.” Louis gives the boy a one-sided grin from over the opposite sides of the car they’re on before opening up his door and sliding himself in.

“She noticed some of her stuff was gone last time,” is what Harry says as soon as he’s inside and slamming his door shut as well, becoming just a bit frustrated with how much space the giant sign is taking up before he finally decides on punching it out of his way and flinging it towards the backseat. “We were almost busted.”

“God, stop it with your whining,” Louis sighs, turning his key into the ignition and ignoring the roll of Harry’s eyes in his peripheral.

“Okay, then you better be prepared to take all the blame if we get caught.”

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

It’s almost like Harry isn’t even paying attention to what he’s pouring, which is why it isn’t surprising when the liquid flows way over the rim of the small glass and pretty much floods the counter. All Louis can do is laugh, however, his elbows leaned against the counter where he stands on the opposite side from Harry, every light in the house turned off besides the lone kitchen light that resides over the sink, and Harry uttering a thousand-years-too-late “fuck” once he realizes he’s overfilled a glass _again_.

Maybe they’ve reached their limit already.

“Hand-eye coordination. You should learn it sometime,” Louis says through breathy giggles as he brings the dripping glass Harry’s just poured for him to his lips. He’s still muddy in many places and sweaty beyond compare and just about disgusting to anyone who isn’t Harry Styles right now, but all those things seem to have taken a backseat in favor of drinking a lot of Harry’s mom’s honey-something drink. He’s forgotten what it is or what it’s called but it has something to do with honey, and it’s quite strong.

“Growing taller than five nine,” Harry replies, his fingers tapping on the counter surface where it’s still drenched with dark liquid, the boy now having changed into comfier nighttime clothes that don’t have holes where his nipples are. “You should also learn it sometime.”

Louis blinks twice at the boy, sensing the heaviness of his own eyelids as he obnoxiously sticks a pinky out in the air whilst cupping his hand around the glass. “This five nine guy just scored the _only_ goal in the last match of the year, thank you very much.”

“The only goal? Wow, _the only goal,_ ” Harry repeats, blinking at himself hazily and gripping the edge of the counter with his free hand. “I don’t remember seeing that.”

“That’s because you were _late_ , loser.”

“ _Hey,_ I’ve already explained myself!” Harry replies, almost comically loud as they both try to resist the urge to burst with laughter like the alcohol is encouraging them to. They simply continue to make wide, glossed eyes at each other as their lips shake and their minds don’t seem to register how much liquid is spilling from both of their glasses. “Don’t act like you’ve been punctual to absolutely every show the drama club put on this year.”

Louis opens his mouth defensively, sucking in air just as Harry’s beating him to it with a finger extended.

“ _And_ basketball game, mister.”

All Louis can do is lazily leer at the boy as he downs the rest of his glass, not even having it in him to once again stress to the boy that _just_ because he’s so much of a nerd that they let him be the person behind the lion mascot costume for the basketball games, doesn’t mean he’s in any way a part of the basketball team, and thus, Louis does not have to attend the games.

The night advances on in pretty much the same way, Louis and Harry not even realizing how unnecessarily long and pointless their over-the-counter drunken banter is becoming, at some point even holding their painful stomachs in laughter after reminiscing a pep rally where Harry’d tried to do a cartwheel in the lion costume and failed miserably. It’s always been funny, but with the states they’re currently in, Louis is grasping onto the counter for dear life with tears welling in his eyes, Harry fully on the kitchen floor as they continue to add details of that day at the pep rally as it comes to them, Louis just _now_ remembering how Harry had to be manually dragged off of the gym floor because he’d fucked up his ankle. God, Louis is seriously best friends with the biggest dork in school.

And it’s absolutely crazy that Louis very much prefers this to whatever’s going on at Zayn’s place. This is a much better way of celebrating—both for the last match and for the end of their entire high school career altogether.

It’s fitting, because they spend so much of the night reminiscing shit. Piggy-backing off of each other once one of them remembers something in relation to another thing, and they practically have their sides pressed into each other where Louis’ joined Harry on the kitchen floor, both dizzy out of their minds and bearing no regard for putting the alcohol back where Anne regularly keeps it so that they don’t get caught. It would only be Harry getting in trouble, anyway. Louis is Anne’s favorite, and she thinks everything he does is perfect.

“God,” Harry breathes, his head rested back against the low kitchen cabinet and chest moving in and out now that he’s just finished up another round of laughter. “Can’t believe high school is over for us.”

All Louis does is rest his head back as well, not having a clear enough mind to do anything else. “Well you better believe it, buddy.”

“I remember us,” Harry begins, Louis just knowing by his gentle tone of voice that a speech is brewing. “Two wide-eyed freshmen. Both somehow wound up in spirit club.”

“Jesus. Spirit club,” Louis mutters, smirking just a hint.

“We were so similar then.”

“Yeah, similar in, we both hadn’t made any actual friends yet so we joined such a lame club.”

Harry laughs a bit, his shoulders shaking with it as he only glances briefly at Louis, Louis barely taking notice of it as his eyes nearly fall closed. If he’s going to sleep soon he should probably shower before that. That would be smart.

“But like…since then we’ve sprouted in different ways, you know,” Harry continues, eyebrows creased thoughtfully. “You, becoming the calm and collected, well-liked jock, and me, becoming the obnoxious gay you’re embarrassed to be seen with half of the time.”

“ _Hey_ ,” Louis replies, sharply turning his eyes to Harry. “I’ve never said that out loud.”

Harry just giggles and shakes his head, lifting himself just a bit and twisting his torso in order to grab both of their glasses off the counter, his mouth muttering a “god, why am I friends with you”. Louis accepts it blindly when Harry is handing him his tiny glass, before reaching high again in order to get the tall bottle of dark drink off of the counter. There’s absolutely no way they’re not going to get caught, what with how empty the bottle is and all, but unsurprisingly, that appears to be the last thing on Harry’s mind once he’s clumsily filling both of their glasses again.

“To us,” Harry declares, raising his glass towards Louis and offering his elbow to the boy in order to suggest that they link.

Louis of course curves his arm around the boy’s with a roll of his eyes, despising how sentimental and sugary the boy gets every time he has a bit of alcohol in his system. Truly unbearable.

The kitchen is literally tilted on its side currently due to Louis’ fuzzy head, but that doesn’t stop him from downing the contents of the glass just as Harry does, their arms linked enough for Louis to spill some on his jersey.

“We should…” Harry starts, eyes nearly going crossed with how out of it he is as he simply drops his empty glass in his lap. “We should just do everything—just fuck it, everything.”

Louis burps before he’s gearing up to reply. “Everything?”

Harry nods once, wholeheartedly, as though he’s actually explained himself clearly. “Yes, everything. We aren’t getting any younger. You in?”

“’Course,” Louis replies gently, his eyes floating closed.

Contrary to whatever they’d just agreed to, they ultimately end up doing nothing.

Three in the morning is fast approaching, and they end up in the living room, wrapped up in separate blankets as they sit on the couch across from the quiet television that’s lighting up everything within ten feet. Louis’ always loved Harry’s place for the blankets. They have the _really_ thick, quilt material ones, which are really handy now since he’s drunk and feels like he’s drifting on a cloud.

That galaxy movie Harry is such a nerd about is on, and Louis has taken the liberty of making weird popping noises with his mouth in order to be annoying.

It appears that Harry is sitting in all his calm coolness, liquor haze allowing him to tune Louis out, even as the boy is sticking his finger in his mouth in order to make more enhanced popping noises and leaning into Harry’s side, aiming all of his sounds right at Harry’s cheek.

It’s like a switch when Harry finally acknowledges it, throwing his head back and emitting an irritated groan. “Oh my god, shut _up_. That was literally the one part I wanted to hear.”

Louis makes a quick glance at the screen, quiet giggles sprouting from his loose lips as all he sees is that green girl looking as though she’s getting ready to fight someone, or something.

“Dude you’ve watched this movie like, a zillion times.”

When all Harry does in response is shake his head and snuggle himself more into his blankets—basically the act of _shrugging Louis off_ (unacceptable), Louis sticks his finger in his mouth one more time and leans in, giving Harry the popping noise of a lifetime.

“I swear, you’re the weirdest person ever,” Harry says exhaustedly, although his lip does curve upward a bit on one side as Louis watches closely, only the light from the television illuminating the mere shadow of it. “Like, everyone at school thinks you’re this cool mystery guy but I know the truth. You’re a weirdo.”

Louis smiles proudly, Harry’s eyes still securely focused on the television screen. “It’s my word against yours.” And then he sticks his finger in his mouth again.

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

When Louis’ stirring awake and finally bringing his heavy eyes to pull themselves open, he’s met with the very unpleasant surprise of Harry’s pale foot about an inch away from his face.

Obviously, they’d fallen asleep on the couch, although Louis only half-remembers that happening. Louis’ rested on the opposite end from Harry, although even in his _sleep_ he has the common decency not to stick his foot in the boy’s face. Or maybe his legs just don’t reach that far. But still.

Louis shoves the boy and his disgusting toes away from his presence as he rises to a sitting position, feeling as though the blanket is suffocating him in heat and everything is way too bright right now. Has Anne ever heard of curtains?

Harry moves around in his sleep and emits an inhumane noise whilst Louis is moving to shove himself up and off the couch, still clawing at his own eyes to get them awake and taking notice of the fact that he’s still a disgusting, soccer-induced mess.

“’m leaving,” Louis mumbles as he walks over to get his bag where he’d dropped it by the coffee table, working halfheartedly in order to shove his feet into his shoes that are laid down on the ground next to it. Once he’s actually gotten that done (after a considerable amount of time) and is getting his bag upon one shoulder, he grabs himself an apple from the central fruit basket on the kitchen table, turning a blind eye to the bottle that’s still on the counter, along with the two glasses that are pushed over and rolling across the surface.

He walks back over to the living room, apple in hand, merely observing the boy in all his slumber, cheek squished into the armrest of the couch as one of the scarves he regularly wears over his chaotic hair nearly slides off his head entirely.

Louis gives him a quick flick in the head that the boy only responds to by creasing his eyebrows and groaning again. “Have fun on your date, or whatever.”

Once he moves to take two steps away is when Harry decides to actually become responsive, of course, the boy uttering a faint “wait”.

Louis takes one step back on his heel, tilting his head at the boy who now has his green elf eyes open to slits.

Instead of actually having anything important to say, the boy puckers his lips in a “gimme a kiss” fashion, letting out a faint giggle that Louis only rolls his eyes towards before continuing on his journey towards the boy’s front door.

“Love you,” he barely hears Harry mumble into the couch cushion, to which Louis just snorts and reaches for the front door knob.

“ _Love_ you!” the boy says much louder, to which Louis can do nothing other than offer a quiet and rushed “love you too” right as he leaves out of the front door and steps out into broad daylight.

He’s almost one hundred percent sure that this is exactly what vampires feel when stepping out into the sun, because the giant sunny thing is nearly skinning him alive as he finds himself walking upon the sidewalk that borders Harry’s lawn, forearm shielding his eyes and headache just now making its arrival.

Most of the walk from the front door to where his car is parked on the curb consists of the dragging sounds of his cleats where they scrape over the ground, along with the crunch of him taking one bite out of the completely dry, browning apple he’s still holding. Once he’s in the car and has hurled his sports bag into the passenger seat with a grunt, he takes his groggy, tired time in starting the car up.

It’s times like these where he’s ever so grateful he and Harry live as close as they do. He literally reeks right about now, and he’s not sure he can endure it much longer.

Once he’s pulling up into the driveway of his own place after a mere five minute drive, skip-jogging up the chipped steps as the scent of cigarette smoke already begins to tease at his nose, it takes him a great deal of fumbling around with the contents of his bag, shoving his hands into his dirt-stained pockets, and patting himself uselessly to realize he doesn’t have his house keys.

Eventually and with defeat, he succumbs to banging on the screen door with his fist, the cheap old thing rattling with every knock he gives it, and he can begin to hear the usual sound of his father talking quite loudly and vehemently with someone who’s on speaker phone. There’s no way he shouldn’t be able to hear the loud banging and clanking of Louis’ fist though, seeing as it sounds like he’s right in the kitchen.

Despite this fact, however, Louis finds himself still standing outside by his lonesome after three rounds of knocking, which isn’t surprising.

It’s quite an idiotic feeling when Louis finally just tries the door and finds that it’s already open. He only takes two seconds to dejectedly close his eyes at himself, before shoving himself into the house and through the second door, that’s open as well.

Louis’ head is hung down as he offers his father a “hello”, setting the door closed gently with one hand and figuring there’s no need to lock it.

At first it seems like his father isn’t even going to acknowledge him, instead just intent on continuing to make a mess of the counter as he sifts through bills and talks on the phone with one of his bulk delivery worker friends while a cigarette remains smelly and lit between two of his fingers, but he finds a good enough pause in his conversation in order to reply to Louis with “Fuck happened to your key?”

“Dunno,” Louis replies, having to slide past the man in order to get to the fridge and secure himself a much needed bottle of water. “Probably lost it in my room, or something.”

No questions about where he went last night. No inquiries about the wildly dirty and unkempt look of his appearance. But none of these things are new to Louis. He simply downs as much of a bottle of water as he can in one go as he holds the fridge open and scans his eyes through its interior for something, anything half-edible since he’d finished the apple in the car and is still unsatisfied, all to the tune of his dad grumbling to his coworker about how Louis is an “irresponsible train wreck” and of course pulling out of the conversation one more time to tell Louis “you’d better find it”.

Louis gives up looking through the fridge before not much longer, pretty much unfazed about the cloud of smoke occupying most of the kitchen and simply shrugging his shoulders as he moves to shut the giant thing. 

“God, I wish you’d smoke outside,” Louis says casually, working to twist the cap back onto his water bottle as he moves toward the hallway of the stairs. “Fucking reeks.”

Because Louis voices this complaint from time to time, he’s completely prepared for the usual grumble of how he doesn’t get a say in anything that goes on under this roof unless he starts helping to pay bills. The speech is a bit of a remix this time around, however, because as Louis’ making his way upstairs one heavy foot at a time, his father has seemed to have also added that since his “footie games” and classes are almost over, he can get a job and start actually pulling some weight.

That’s not something that Louis will ponder on right now.

Right now, all Louis is focused on is getting into a shower, possibly making use of the super old bag of chips he hopefully still has under his bed, and getting his headphones on in order to trick his mind into believing he’s the only one in the house.

Unless his father bursts into his room as he often does, after Louis is unresponsive to his name being called. He wonders if that’ll happen today too.

Louis will take his chances though, which is why he ends up doing exactly what he’d intended, all his short-term (well, super short-term) goals achieved in just about thirty minutes, Louis finding himself reclined on his bed in comfy clothes and freshly showered skin, giant bag of greasy chips in tow, and big cushiony headphones comfy around his head. Life is more fulfilling when one sets super short-term goals; they’re much more attainable and are almost always completed.

He’s often perfectly content like this. Shuffled, completely unknown piano music playing in his ears, no additional sounds, no additional voices, nothing to do in an immediate time frame, no phone after having tossed it to the side for today. People really think he’s kidding when he says he doesn’t need much to enjoy himself. Not even a fridge void of food has ruined his peace today.

Eventually, he does make the decision to pull his laptop up off of the nightstand, figuring that since he was lucky enough to win this thing in a school raffle and he _definitely_ would not own one under any other circumstances, he should make use of it.

He rarely ever does touch the thing though, but now he feels he should do the normal, responsible student thing of checking and confirming deadlines, summer opportunities, all that good stuff. It’s all the same old, same old, his eyes glazing over as he reads about all the programs and the courses and the important dates, just knowing in the back of his mind that none of this would even be remotely possible given his financial background, but still looking at it anyway. Just so he can say he tried. Just so, when all those counselors and teachers and family friends ask, he won’t be lying if he says he’s looked into it.

Even if he only did that for fifteen minutes.

And then closed his laptop and instead decided to play with a stray slinky on his bed.

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

“No way,” Louis says, his response being to Zayn, although it really could’ve been to anyone as a good portion of the soccer team (along with some others) surround his locker and discuss how gosh darn fun the party from the other night was. 

It’s five minutes until the school day starts, no one in Louis’ immediate circle seems to care (which means he definitely chooses the right people to surround himself with), and he finds himself feeling feathery light and free of all cares as he leans against his locker with an arm around Jas (they’re a thing again, he guesses) and a grape lollipop nearly hanging out of his mouth. He’d bought it from some fundraising freshman before he’d even entered the building.

“ _Really_ ,” Zayn replies, as always, much more giddy in energy than the conversation calls for. He’s always been such a wide-eyed member of the team, probably since this is his first year even at this school and he’s transparently eager to make good impressions, especially with those higher up than him. “I had the lamp on my head and _everything_!”

“Classic lamp head. Guess it’s unfortunate I didn’t get to witness that cliché high school party thing at least once before I graduated.”

“You fucking suck, dude,” Liam chimes in, almost mirroring Louis as he keeps his arm around his girlfriend (head cheerleader Annalisa, the magnificent—they’ve been on and off for two years). He has on one of the many warm up sports jackets they’ve accumulated over the years at this school and his hair looks just a bit more particularly styled and upright today. “Can’t believe you missed the last after party we’ll ever have.”

Louis makes a show of exaggeratingly pouting his lips at Liam in an almost mocking manner, garnering a few chuckles from those around him, others instead agreeing with Liam and being melodramatic in calling Louis a traitor.

All Jas does is chuckle beside him, bringing Louis to pull her in just a tad more where his fingertips splay upon the rough material of her jean jacket.

“You gonna get all sentimental on me now, Li?” Louis asks.

“For the last match? Yes, I kinda am. The fuck were you doing anyway—“

“Excuse me, sorry,” is what Louis hears before he actually sees the boy, Harry clearly having to carefully steer his way through the tiny crowd around their locker before he finally makes it right to where Louis is standing there, leaned against it with Jas under his arm.

Liam is the last person that has to step aside for him, and it’s clear that Harry’s being extremely careful not to graze his shoulder in passing as he mutters one last “excuse me”.

Louis simply slides aside a bit for the boy as Harry hurriedly works the combination amidst the continuing conversations and loud laughter and Jas whispering to Louis about whether or not they should fuck off during lunch and get some cheeseburgers.

The boy is just…frantic. That’s the best way to describe him. Not just right now, but in general, he’s simply a frantic person. He moves both with purpose and with rush as he’s taking books out of his locker and shoving them into his backpack, quickly having to pick one up that slips out of grip and hits the ground, and then he’s shutting the locker and vanishing into the crowd around Louis’ locker just as the bell is ringing.

Almost immediately, Liam opens his mouth and faces Louis, which isn’t surprising to Louis as he quirks an eyebrow and twists around the stem of the lollipop as he sucks on it.

“He’s so lame,” is all he says, almost tiredly and disappointedly.

Louis takes his time keeping the sphere of the lollipop in his mouth for a moment, really wanting to get a good deal of the succulent grape flavor out of it before speaking, words muffled around the candy pop.

“Define ‘lame’,” he says nonchalantly, instantly receiving an eye roll, heavy sigh combo from the boy in front of him as he leads himself and Annalisa away by the arm he still has around her shoulder.

Liam’s…never been fond of Harry. As soon as they’d both made the soccer team in freshman year, the disliking was sort of like a switch within Liam that had been turned on, as though it just didn’t add up to him that Louis would still want to hang with Harry when they pretty much became instantly well-known throughout the school and garnered friends quickly. Going into sophomore and junior year his aversion to Harry simply became progressively more blatant and outspoken, when previously it’d been more whispered, implicit. Louis _could_ say he knows why, but he also doesn’t want to jump to conclusions about the boy or start up any defensive arguments. All he knows is that Liam comes from an upper class, traditional-minded family, complete with an uptight father who owns a big city restaurant, a complacent mother who doesn’t stand up for herself, and one older sister who’s already off to college and goes mute on them for long periods of time. Still, a better life at home than Louis by miles.

It isn’t much longer when everyone’s finally starting to disperse in order to get to the classes they were supposed to be in five minutes ago, Louis still staying perfectly in place where he’s leaned against his locker as Jas gives him a thorough peck on the cheek in goodbye.

Louis figures it’s best to get a move on himself once there are only a few scatterings of people left out in the hallways after quite a while, the boy swiping his backpack from the ground and giving his tongue a rest as he holds onto his lollipop.

It doesn’t even take him two steps to realize he hears Harry.

Like, faintly.

The boy didn’t go to class. And he pretty much _always_ goes to class unless Louis pressures him into ditching.

Except now, as Louis takes slow, curious steps toward the end of one of the vast halls that turns into another one, pretty much right at a corner, he sees him. Not being in class.

And talking to that guy. Louis’ not really good with faces, but he’s going to take a gamble and guess it’s the one that had (allegedly) asked the boy on a date the other day.

They’re stood quite cozy by one of the water fountains, Harry nearly making Louis gag with the way he’s holding one of his arms in a shy manner. Like, just be a normal person for god’s sake. And stop giggling so weird. He’s pretty sure the entire student body can hear it when he giggles so loud and awkwardly.

Louis doesn’t really know what his plan of action is when he pulls his phone out of his pocket and dials Harry’s number, only taking two tiny steps backwards into the hallway he’d come from in order to stay hidden as he brings his phone to his ear. He just knows that he’s doing it. And somehow, this is a good idea. His subconscious mind has already decided that.

He can faintly hear the faraway, quiet sound of Harry saying “hold on”, and then the very discernible, slight static of his “yeah” once he answers the phone.

“Let’s skip,” Louis says without thinking, still keeping an eye on the both of them and sort of starting to feel like a secret agent.

When it seems the guy Harry’d been talking to needs to be somewhere, he offers Harry a sweet nod of goodbye, Harry responding with a cliché flutter of his fingers at the boy as he replies to Louis through the flirtatious smile he has on. “What are you talking about?”

“Like…skip,” Louis repeats, eyes growing bored. “Are you deaf?”

When Harry takes this moment to stammer a bit, torn between clarifying that he is not deaf and that the idea of skipping is absolutely preposterous, Louis just continues.

“Do you not remember…like, that night?” Louis begins, sighing as he leans his shoulder against the nearest locker, now out of view of Harry but still knowing right where he is. “We’re doing everything, remember?”

There’s a sort of pause that follows, long enough for Louis to think the boy has crept up on him and causing Louis to dart his eyes to the left, right toward the hallway Harry would be emerging from.

“We haven’t skipped together before?” he finally asks, obviously still in the same spot.

“I don’t think so. Not a full day.”

“Damn. Four years and I just now realized that,” Harry sighs, Louis rolling his eyes as he adjusts his backpack on one shoulder. “If we’re gonna skip, I want it to be extravagant. Well thought-out. It’s an event now.”

“Yeah, yeah whatever,” Louis says, getting impatient as he watches one of his feet tap against the ground.

“But today I have to make up a quiz in lunch period, so…”

“Ugh, you are such a drag.”

“Tomorrow?” Harry asks, dismissing his insult.

Louis takes a moment to chew on his bottom lip for a bit once he lets his head lightly hit the locker, because usually when he gets a sudden urge to do something, he wants to do it _now_. That’s kind of what comes with the super short-term goals and all.

“Whatever,” Louis begins, pushing himself away from the locker and beginning his way down the hall, intent to reach his first class for whatever time he has left in it.

“Maybe whatever will be our always,” Harry replies happily before the line cuts off.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> senioritis (sen·ior·i·tis)  
> /ˌsēnyəˈrīdəs/
> 
> a supposed affliction of students in their final year of high school or college, characterized by a decline in motivation or performance.
> 
> "I try not to let my grades suffer from my senioritis"

“Fina-fucking- _lee_ ,” Louis says, letting out a humongous sigh of gratitude as he kicks his feet up upon the dining table, comfortably reclined in the booth as he sits across from Harry. “Actual fucking breakfast.” He gestures around himself, the both of them having ordered quite the mouthful, not giving a care as to whose plate is whose as sausage links, sausage _patties_ , stacked flapjacks, bacon strips, scrambled cheesy eggs, flaky biscuits, and syrup jugs remain laid out in front of them. “Finally I can get you to agree to this without whining about your classes or your thighs.”

The boy has his very signature sunglasses rested over his eyes, looking like quite the cool guy as he reclines back in that same position as though he pretty much lives at this establishment. Harry’s always sort of envied that about him, how it’s rare for him to ever look out of place or unfamiliar in any environment—truly a super power Harry wishes he’d had himself.

“Just _plan_ it, all the boy had to do was _plan_ it,” Harry murmurs to himself, right before digging himself a forkful of cheesy eggs. “Ask me when I have a test, when I have to be in class, you know, basic full-time student things. I don’t have the carefree capacity to just up and do things like you do.”

Louis’ mouth is very much full with both the biscuit and sausage link he’d stuffed into it during Harry’s very valid spew of very valid points. “Pretty sure everyone can be like that. You just choose not to be.”

“You must be great at planning date nights,” Harry begins, before positioning his hand into a phone and bringing it up to his ear as he switches between voices. “’Wanna go on a date right now this second’? _Oh Louis, of course I’ll drop everything and go on a date at a restaurant you probably haven’t even called to reserve yet.”_

The most Louis can offer is a suppressed smirk as he licks at his grease stained lips and makes work of cutting his sausage into pieces, ignoring how Harry is fanning himself dramatically and instead choosing to defiantly brush him off.

Harry’s sure that one may have hit deep because it’s kind of a silently known thing around school that the girls Louis’ paraded around with complain about how unromantic and flighty he can be as a partner.

“I’m willing to bet money _your_ date was a train wreck though,” Louis fires back, popping part of a sausage link in his mouth before he reclines again, feet still comfortably propped with ankle crossed over ankle. Harry’s definitely noticed the subtle way one of the apron-wearing ladies behind the front counter has been looking at him though. “Which is why you never told me how it went.”

Harry’s demeanor switches quite quickly, the boy a lot less full of jokes and ha ha’s and instead much more grinning and twinkly at the eyes once he begins to poke at his eggs. “It was good, I guess…” he begins, not being able to control his now shy grin. “Great, really.”

Ezra had taken him to dinner, and that’s. Quite typical date stuff, actually. Conversation never ran out, Harry couldn’t have felt more honored and humbled to have such a Fine Man making googly eyes at him over the menu, he’d told Harry he’d always sort of thought he was cute (which is enough to keep him inwardly swooning for the next month or two) and it’d ended with a chaste kiss to Harry’s cheek (after he’d walked him to his front door and _everything_ ), both of them being reassured that they would make arrangements to hang out again. He’s…a gentleman. And Harry really has not dealt with a gentleman in a while—almost as though he’s been…avoiding them. Subconciously.

“Wow, _great_ , that’s a really vivid account of such a fascinating date,” Louis replies, offering a short lived smirk around a full flapjack he’s just bitten into, dry of syrup and butter. He’s always liked it better that way, the weirdo.

“I dunno,” Harry shrugs, still not meeting eyes with Louis. “I just wish I had more dating experience, because I’m not sure if I’m supposed to come out of a date thinking, _good, great, nothing went wrong_ , or _oh my god, there were fireworks, I feel a twinkle in my chest_ , or something.”

“Jesus, Haz. It’s a date, not _The Bachelor_ ,” Louis replies, Harry snorting at him before going back to eating with purpose.

“Whatever,” Harry replies, cheeks just as stuffed as Louis’ as he grabs two flapjacks off of the center plate with one hand and the handle of the syrup with the other. “It’s not like I would ever ask _you_ for dating advice anyway.”

“Of course. Please don’t.”

“Gladly,” Harry responds, drizzling his pancakes with maple syrup and causing the sweet scent to surround their table. “I just like…I really hope we progress nicely. I definitely feel the potential between us.”

“Really?” Louis asks, another hearty bite taken out of his pancake before he speaks again. “What’s his last name?” His eyes are sparkling and amused, as though he desperately wants to just take the piss out of Harry, which is probably true. It’s pretty much the main thing their friendship consists of.

“Not—“ Harry begins, frustrated as he sets the syrup down. “I’m not going off of how much I _know_ him, I just feel a really genuine, effortless _energy._ From a guy who actually fits my _taste_. It’s rare that a guy comes along and pursues _me_ who fits my taste.”

“Blondes? Guys who look like towel boys? Country club bloke? Groomed, prom king types?”

“Louis you were literally prom king—“

“Clean cut and polished looking?” Louis continues, furrowing his brows. “Guess I just didn’t take you for that kinda guy.”

“Well then you’re doing a shitty job as my supposed best friend,” Harry says sarcastically, before sticking his fork into a stack of cut pancakes and bringing it to his mouth. “That’s always been my endgame type—you know, _after_ the dirty, douchebag guys and stuff."

Louis simply emits a single hum of acknowledgement with his mouth full of pancakes, probably because he _did_ already know that. Harry has always been one to dream of an eventual house in a nice suburban neighborhood with a vanilla-smelling sap who probably knows how to fold thick napkins into the shape of doves. 

Harry suddenly pipes up with something that momentarily crosses his mind. "Also what’s up with you and Jas? Thought that ship sailed.”

Louis sighs quite calmly and blissfully as he moves to slide his sunglasses into his hair, Harry finally having the usual view of where he has slight bags under his eyes, always this sort of permanent sleepiness to those things that just adds to his cool demeanor.

“Ah, I guess the ship has arrived again,” is how Louis chooses to reply, settling even further into his seat and bringing his plastic cup up to himself in order to sip at the straw.

And that’s all it is to Louis. No insight, no long, miserable monologues about his love life, no constant wondering about where his current romantic endeavor is headed, just current acceptance. Harry would lose his fucking shit being as uncaring as the boy sat in front of him right now. Fuck, the fact that he’d accidentally snort laughed at his date with Ezra is _still_ in the back of his mind, his panicked brain wondering if the guy has already secretly decided he won’t ever call him again solely because of that.

As always though, Harry tries to push Louis a little bit. Just to see if he’ll budge. Like, there _has_ to be a threshold where carefree, indifferent Louis turns into passionate, ruffled Louis, right?

“The semester is almost over,” Harry says, now toying with his food with his fork again as they’re allowed to meet eyes. “Gotta at least be thinking about whether or not you’re gonna drag her, like…past high school. Ya know…college…” He picks his words wisely, trying his best not to be too assuming right now over bacon strips and soggy pancakes, especially since life _beyond_ this isn’t something they’ve even really touched on lately.

Louis’ face twists up only slightly, Harry easily able to have missed it if he’d blinked. “What’s college?”

“Shut up.”

As extremely comfortable and unspoken and absolutely almost telepathic they are with each other as friends, one of the very few things (actually…probably the only thing) they both seem to be too timid to tread upon talking about is college. Or the _absence_ of college, possibly.

Louis is a man of much mystery, so Harry won’t even begin trying to speculate the reasons _he’s_ closed his mouth to the thought of it.

But _Harry_ …is terrified. He’ll never admit it out loud, but he’ll definitely admit it to himself.

This might actually be the first time in a long time that they’ll be separated. Separated indefinitely. After seeing each other almost every day for four straight years. And Harry has absolutely no idea how to deal with that potential, impending reality.

Of course, Louis hates being soft and “sappy” and sentimental, so Harry keeps that to himself, but the both of them haven’t even talked about _where_ they’re going. Harry knows where he’s going himself though, he’s already got it settled and planned and mapped out and everything, and Louis hasn’t really said much about his future plans, but they’re both so scared to touch it out of the possibility that they might have to hear the other one say they’re doing something completely different and thus silently accept that their lives are going to split for the first time in what seems like eons. 

It used to be pretty certain for the both of them, that they’d do _this_ and _that_ after high school and use the bonus room as a second bedroom and buy a jacuzzi and get a blue colored carpet, but as they got closer to when it would actually _happen_ , they just…stopped talking about it, vividly fantasizing about it, just total silence and static.

It’s simply exasperating because Louis is (obviously) his best friend, and Harry’s the only one who has unconditionally provided the boy with a regular safe haven from the actual Satan that is his father, and—

He just really doesn’t want to think about it.

“My dad’s kinda getting on my ass,” Louis says after a while, shifting in his seat. “About buckling down, and shit. Getting a job to help out.”

“For the summer?” Harry asks, hoping this question will be insightful enough without pushing it.

And all Louis does is shrug, pursing his lips in the process before suddenly sitting up much straighter and abruptly snatching a few stacked pieces of pancake from Harry’s plate.

“ _Hey_ ,” Harry says, mouth open as he switches between looking at his slightly emptier plate and Louis, who just grins lopsidedly as he pops the pieces into his mouth, syrup running down the spaces between his fingers. “I thought you didn’t even _like_ it with syrup on it.”

Louis speaks with his full mouth, most of everything seeming to have been shoved into one cheek. “I like fucking with you.”

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

“Stop slowing down!” Harry hears from behind him, for probably the third time since they’ve started this whole scooter adventure. 

It’s just that this thing goes really fast. And Harry sort of values his life.

Harry voices his whine out into the open air as Louis flies past him on the sidewalk, the sound of a nearby car beeping almost overshadowing his voice. “Do you want me to fucking _die?_ Is that what you want?”

This has been a long day. As much as he’s felt like days at school could seem never-ending and dragging, he’s truly experienced exactly how excruciatingly long a school day is now that he’s not in school during it, especially after having gone to breakfast at eight in the morning. It is astronomically lengthy.

This has been a long day of breakfast, and then sightseeing (if looking at gardens, buildings, and spray-painted wall art that they’ve grown up around for years counts as “sightseeing”), and then throwing rocks into a nearby lake so that they skip across the surface (it took them a good fifteen tries before they got the hang of it), and then observing street performers and singers and feeling like absolute tools since they don’t have any physical cash to give, and now riding lightning fast scooters downtown as Harry holds onto the handle bars for dear life and Louis is currently miles ahead of him without a care. 

The school day still has about two hours left.

By now they’ve both come to the sort of arbitrary agreement that it doesn’t count unless they’re doing something during _all_ the hours of school, so that’s why Harry is pushing through, even though this is a part of the skip day he would’ve liked to have left out.

It appears that he gets his wish eventually though—although not in the best way possible, because it happens in the form of Harry accidentally crashing into Louis from behind in response to not having been watching ahead of him (it’s Louis’ fault for completely stopping after he’d been literally miles ahead for the last fifteen minutes). Apparently Louis had stopped to look at the riverfront upon the more calm, quiet part of downtown.

The boy’s peaceful ogling moment had come to a quick end when Harry’d crashed into him at who-knows-how many miles per hour, sending them both tumbling off the sidewalk into the grass (which they’d so thankfully been situated near and _not_ the road).

At first Harry’s just a bit weary of how Louis’ going to scold him once it seems both their scooters are done banging against the ground and both of their bodies are done rolling over one another, but when the boy’s pained groans and “what the fuck” evolves into him, breathless and laid on his back, emitting huffs of chuckles as he stares up at the sky, Harry feels a gentle wave of relief come over him as he remains propped on his elbows.

“You are so stupid,” Louis guffaws, teeth on display as he keeps his gaze up at the clouds.

Harry’s never been afraid to internally acknowledge how rewarding it feels, getting Louis to smile like this. A full, genuine smile from Louis Tomlinson is definitely not something to be taken lightly—almost everyone in town knows this. It’s something you cherish, something you brag about, something you use in order to convince your precal teacher they should round your grade up. It’s quite a feat.

And Harry has absolutely no idea how he’s achieved it in this moment, but he’ll take it.

In contrast to the award-winning bow Harry’s doing in his head, what he does in actuality is bring his wristwatch up to his face, checking for the time. “Looks like they get out in two hours. What now?”

Louis brings a finger up to his lips, his laughter dying down as he seems to ponder it. “Two hours…two hours,” he mumbles contemplatively.

Harry leans in a bit, as though sharing secret information as he remains on his stomach and Louis remains on his back. “ _Two hours_.”

They continue on like that for a short while, thinking and formulating despite their heads being mostly void of ideas, and then Louis’ eyes click just a little bit wider.

“I’ve got it.”

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

They decided to see a movie.

And quite a bad one, but they both knew that going into it. They’d deliberately chosen one of the smaller, indie ones with horrible reviews on Rotten Tomatoes, just because they knew they’d be able to bag on it in the movie theatre—and boy, were there a lot of things to bag on.

So they’d spent most of their time teasing and cackling about the unnecessary romantic subplots and arbitrary cut scenes, occasionally making a mockery of the delivery styles from certain actors (“I bet he went to Juilliard for this”), and also managed to get scolded and told to be quiet by a couple that’d _literally_ spent most of the damn thing sucking each other’s faces and had no right to even say anything about common decency.

Louis had been a jerk and agreed with them, however, blaming all of the constant commentary and laughing on Harry, before apologizing on his behalf. The asshole.

They really were not prepared for the movie to be well over three hours long in running though, but it didn’t seem to matter when they were actually watching it and so invested in adding their unnecessary quips and jabbing each other in the ribs every time something ridiculous happened, popcorn scattered on the floor all around them.

Now they’ve exited the movie complex, the school day having ended sometime ago, and they’ve successfully completed a nicely planned, well thought-out skip day.

“We’ve completed a nicely planned, well thought-out skip day,” Harry declares, walking alongside Louis and still sipping at the cherry slushy drink he’d had in the theater. “Don’t you think?”

“Yeah, actually,” Louis replies, hands deep in his pockets as he kicks at the sidewalk. “Yeah.”

And although he sounds noncommittal and whatever-ish when he says it, Harry knows this boy, and a great feeling of gratitude comes over himself at the fact that they both agree that this day was successful and fun. Louis rarely ever says things he doesn’t mean.

So they’re both in comfortable, pleasant agreement of that, and not much else needs to be said as it becomes clear their day is drawing to a close, the both of them just about fully worn out. They just continue to walk down the sidewalk, leisurely and without purpose, Harry certain the other boy is waiting for the sun to go down, just like he is. Harry’s also certain they’re probably the only ones traversing upon this avenue with no real destination or place to be. It _is_ a Tuesday, after all.

It doesn’t take long for the sun to begin its downward journey, bringing the sky to be painted with pink all around them, which is then later followed by the darkness of near nighttime as he and Louis have continued to walk aimlessly (and honestly, probably in a circle) for nearly thirty minutes.

Harry loves how they’ve been peaceful with not saying anything. He’s always loved that they’re able to do that. Something doesn’t always need to be _said_ , and Harry feels like often times a lot of people in the world don’t understand that—as though something is always wrong when there’s silence. Sometimes Harry needs to remember that himself too, because literally with every person _other_ than Louis he’s always working extra hard to fill in empty spaces, say something interesting, keep attention on himself, when really he just needs to remind himself of moments like these, when it’s…good to be quiet. Louis telling him to shut up so much really makes sense.

“Wait—“ Louis begins, voice barely heard as he grabs at Harry’s forearm, gaze focused upward and glasses still rested in his hair as the late evening wind tousles the strands around it. “I’ve always wanted to sit up there.”

Harry decides it’d be in his best interest to join Louis in whatever he’s looking at, so they find themselves stood in place in the middle of the sidewalk, both looking up at one of the skyscrapers near the core of the city—this one being particularly tall, however. It might even be the tallest one in town. It’s towering, it’s extravagant with its glass exterior, and it even twists a little bit. It’s super cool to ogle at, and it always has been whenever Harry’s driven around this city and seen it from a distance.

And it can be seen—well, if Harry squints enough, since it _is_ late—that there may even be a little open area on the rooftop, because there’s a railing along the border of it, but Harry’s not sure if random people are even allowed up there. He’s not even sure what the building _is_. He’s never known or cared to know, because he didn’t have a reason to.

But now, since Louis is tugging him along by the forearm and starting towards it, he guesses that reason has finally come.

The chances of them being able to get into such a high profile building and _then_ somehow obtaining access to the roof are very slim, but Harry tags along anyway, not wanting to taint the serenity of their recent walk by voicing his negative “what if”’s.

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

Harry knows, with absolutely everything in his mind, heart, and soul that this wouldn’t have happened if he were just on his own.

Somehow, and someway, Louis just gets what he fucking wants.

Of _course_ this is a hotel, of _course_ Louis was able to slide his way past the front desk by claiming he'd probably dropped his key in a hallway upstairs, and of _course_ they’re now on the rooftop, thirty-five stories high and in an area where it seems like hotel residents are allowed to hang out.

The universe works in the boy’s favor sometimes and it's truly perplexing.

“Um…” Harry begins, just beginning to catch a glimpse of exactly how high they are now that they’ve gotten up the stairs and are stepping upon the roof, decorated with spherical, glowing border lights, dark maroon couches that are vacant and plush, bamboo plants at convenient corners, and a vacant bar area that appears as though its hours are closed. “This is really high.” His steps grow slower with each moment his feet settle upon the ground, because he can see every single light of the surrounding city from here—one by every microscopic house, at the street corner of every gas station, switching from red to green at every intersection. Jesus Christ.

“C’mon,” Louis says over his shoulder, the boy walking right past the couches set there for their sitting pleasure and heading for the railing that frames the roof. Harry’s pretty much still significantly close to the entrance of this roof while Louis’ already got his arms set upon the railing, looking down upon everything with his back to the boy.

When it becomes apparent that Harry’s taking quite the while to bring himself over, Louis turns his chin slightly over his shoulder and blinks at the boy with exhaustion. 

“Are you scared?” Louis begins, using the strength of his arms to push himself up onto the railing, working to get his legs on either side, one leg swinging and dangled over the surface of the roof and the other one swinging and dangled over the _literal million foot drop_ of city between the roof and the sidewalk below.

Harry’s not going to let Louis know he’s scared, though. Definitely not, because the boy is thinking that he is right now, and Harry won’t give him the satisfaction.

“Why would I be?” Harry replies, now putting just a little more purpose in his step as he approaches Louis, taking notice of how the railing _is_ quite thick, and flat, and sturdy, and wide enough to sit on, but still. As he’s taking the time to sit himself exactly like Louis in order to mirror him, it’s quite clear that if he shifts to the left too much he will literally fall to his death. Literally.

“This is just really high. That’s a fact,” Harry says, fully facing Louis as both of their legs remain on either side of the railing, his fingers tapping against the surface in front of him. He won’t dare look to the left of him and get a glimpse of what exactly he’ll be smashing into when he falls to his death.

Louis wholeheartedly is looking down at the spectacle, however, eyes glistening at all the lights that remain down below and the cars that breeze by with their headlights on and the murmured, whistling nightlife seeming to just begin. He just gazes, with sort of an observant, watchful air. Clearly very aware of life around him.

“Beautiful,” is all Louis says, clear and simple.

Harry remains looking straight ahead, however, knowing that no amount of awestruck adulation will get him to risk looking down and shitting his pants. Instead, he chooses to acknowledge the quite strange occurrence of Louis finding beauty in something and then choosing to voice it out loud.

“God, who are you?”

“Shut up,” Louis says, shaking his head with a smirk. “It really is, though. C’mon, look.”

Harry doesn’t move to look, but it seems Louis doesn’t notice, as it’s apparent he’s very immersed in however life is enchanting him down below. Harry, on the contrary, has a heart that’s racing faster with every second, his finger tips nearly going numb with how much he’s tapping against the surface.

He comes to realize he’s going to have to calm himself down soon, however, because this is clearly going to be a very long moment, evident in the way Louis’ glassed eyes are practically glued down below. It’s almost like he’s a statue—not a solid, rigid one that gives you an eerie feeling though, but like one of those Ancient Greek ones. The only thing really moving is his hair, swaying around his sunglasses and providing a stark contrast from the gentle, starry sky behind it. The boy just blinks down below, and he doesn’t care about how risky their seats are, and he probably doesn’t even remember Harry’s in front of him, and—

When did Harry’s heart start beating much more…calmly?

Harry’s knitting his eyebrows at himself for a moment as he swallows, all of a sudden remembering how high up he is, how he should actually be scared shitless, and it all helps to bring the trepidation right back into his gut.

“Welp…” Harry begins, cutting into the silence as he brings his wrist to his face. “School’s been over for a while now.”

It seems the two of them sort of…exist again, and Harry isn’t just another faceless body living in Louis’ world once the boy is bringing his head up to meet eyes with him. 

“Thank you, gadget boy. We really needed you to check your watch for that.”

Harry strokes his chin as he leans forward just a bit. “Gadget boy, wow—actually, that’s definitely one of the better nicknames you’ve given me.”

Louis’ perking up a bit, sitting straighter as he raises a hand towards Harry. “It can’t be better than—“

Louis putting a little too much weight on his right side and thus, wobbling only _slightly_ (but still too much for the fact that they’re on top of a fucking _skyscraper_ ) is what interrupts him, because Harry’s arms fly out to steady him before the boy can even process the momentary loss of balance himself.

Just like that, Harry’s heart race has skyrocketed again—but actually, when had it come down again? And he hadn’t realized it _again_?

That doesn’t matter, though. Now, his heart is thumping nearly out of his chest, his eyes are wide as they move up and down the boy’s face, and his big hands grip the boy at both arms as all Louis can offer is a slightly concerned “fuck”.

“Okay,” Harry says calmly. “Okay, we’re done.” He’s already scooting back and preparing to get himself down from the railing of death, even as Louis’ whining and telling him it wasn’t that big of a deal and that he wants just a little bit longer. “Nope, we’re done.”

Harry’s already halfway across the roof and towards the entrance as the boy starts to chuckle behind him, clearly finding his dramatics funny.

Even though Harry is very stone and rigid and fucking _shaken_ right now, the tiniest, most miniscule of smiles pokes at his cheek as he reaches for the doorknob to the exit, because—

Louis laughed. Probably with a full _smile_ , it sounded like.

Another win for Harry.

Two in _one day_.

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

Harry doesn’t even know why he still tries with school lunch, especially due to the fact that his time here is coming to a close and he doesn’t have to put himself through this anymore.

Despite that, however, he still finds himself poking at the color deprived macaroni on his tray with a limp hand and a prodding plastic fork, not even the least bit interested in the somewhat edible bread roll that lays next to the main course.

More recently, he's begun to find himself next to Niall during lunch period these days, the boy still being a guy of from-home meals and portable lunchboxes even in his senior year of high school, which explains why he’s happily eating what looks like a pure white turkey sandwich and a clear bag of grapes.

For the past twenty minutes, conversations have been happening around Harry that he hasn’t cared to chime in on. Not because he doesn’t want to or anything, lunch is usually a particularly amusing time, even with most of the people at the table he sits at consisting of honors students who usually debate over things he’d have to acquire another brain cell to understand.

But Harry usually avoids the cafeteria as much as he can, either because he’s making up tests or doing extra credit during lunch period, going to the library during lunch period, working on a project during lunch period, or visiting many of the cliques in the different classrooms and band rooms in order to make himself useful. He just hates succumbing to…the actual lunchroom.

He guesses it’s just the official arrival of his senioritis making things a little more draining this time around.

Quite unusually, Louis is on the extreme other side of the lunchroom with the normal crowd of people he surrounds himself with when Harry isn’t gluing himself to his side like a Cool People Repellant, and the place is so big and bustling with crowds of students who stand and loiter and race to the lunch line that Harry can’t even see him, but make no mistake, Harrry knows he’s there. He can hear Zayn laughing from here, as well as literally _feel_ the pull of magnetic energy from that very corner of the cafeteria, as though everyone should be going over there to get a whiff of what it feels like to be admired.

“Trouble in paradise?” Niall asks, bringing Harry out of his slight paralysis as he blinks his eyes to life.

“Huh?” Harry asks, now continuing his action of dancing his fork through his food.

“With Louis,” Niall continues, the crackling noise of his right hand digging through his grapes following his words. “You usually would’ve whined about him at least once by now.”

That thought brings Harry to half grin for a little over a second, because that may very well be true, and kind of funny, actually.

Harry’s certainly not coming to terms with the harsh reality that they may be going separate ways as a pair, and that he should focus on cherishing him more than complaining about the little things he normally would. He’s certainly not doing that.

“No, no,” Harry begins, knitting his brows for a moment. “Only trouble I’m having right now is with Ezra.”

“Fancy Date Ezra?”

“ _Yes_ ,” Harry replies, flipping his phone where it rests on top of the table out of instinct. “He hasn’t texted me since that night, and I’ve been fucking driving myself crazy checking my phone every second thinking his name with the flying heart emojis next to it is going to be there, waiting for me.”

“Why don’t you text him first?”

Harry emits a groan upon watching his screen display absolutely no unread messages for probably the tenth time today, before setting it back on the table, facedown. “He specifically told me _he’d_ text _me_. I mean, he’d practically promised.”

“Wow,” Niall replies, his words sounding muffled and bringing Harry to assume he’s just downed a face full of sandwich. “Sucks, man.”

“Sucks?” Harry asks, head snapping to the boy, only to find him looking indifferent as his gaze remains ahead and his cheeks remain stuffed. “ _Sucks_? Do you know how long it’s been since I’ve made out with a guy? Too fucking long. Your energy is not matching how fucking horrible this is for me.”

All Niall does is shrug both shoulders, the slight shine of his glass lenses over his eyes irritating Harry in frustrating ways. “Don’t understand, uh…” he begins, swallowing a bit before continuing. “The point in even getting yourself involved with something so serious right at the end of high school.”

Harry’s taking in a significant breath in order to fire back at the boy’s indifference with the valid points he has prepared, but he definitely begins to notice the boy isn’t just shrugging off Harry’s existence and looking at nothing, but…after Harry follows his gaze and joins him in whatever it must be that‘s got his attention, he’s looking at Zayn.

It’d be easy to assume he’s looking at anything else, since the boy’s table _is_ extremely far from here and there are bodies and other groups at tables in between, but Zayn’s very much standing on top of their lunch table right now, Harry having absolutely no idea what he’s doing as he bends over fully and looks as though he’s mimicking a football position or something, and it seems to be getting quite a hoot of laughter from everyone around.

Harry’s immediate idea is to nudge the boy and tease him about it, as well as scold him for ogling at the junior across the room instead of listening to Harry’s dilemma, but it quickly dawns upon him that this is…pleasant. He’s never seen (or even heard of) Niall crushing on someone, and it’s sweet to witness. Even if it _is_ the ridiculously pretty boy on Louis’ team of douchebags who calls Harry by the completely wrong name in all seriousness.

Contrary to how it seems right now, Harry spends lunch with Louis more times than he doesn’t. Remember when he’d mentioned roaming the school building day to day and making lunch productive and unpredictable most times? Yeah, Louis is usually by his side during that, only occasionally choosing to sit himself with his cool people posse when his mood calls for it. But more recently—specifically, for the last four school days in a row, the boy has chosen the second option faithfully.

It’s actually rare that all the people of Louis’ social group and soccer team come together to sit and laugh and dominate the lunchroom with how loud they are, and Harry believes it’s all thanks to the soccer season finally coming to a close, as well as the seniors having nothing better to do and wanting to spend as much time with each other as possible, reminiscing all that they can before they have to graduate.

But.

Does Harry not deserve that too? Does he not deserve all the time he needs in order to spend what could potentially be his last moments with his best friend? They’re supposed to be doing _everything_. Fucking everything. Preferably as much as they can before they graduate. And they can’t do that if Louis keeps fucking off with his friends every time he’s free.

Louis hangs out with them a lot now that the soccer season has ended. It’s not bad, Harry’s not trying to be overbearing about it, but it surely is…different. Especially since Harry’s aware the boy regards Liam as his best friend as well. It doesn’t hurt at all. It really doesn’t.

He’s hardly even seen Louis since they’d skipped that day. It was a really fun day, probably the most fun day he’s had in a while, to be honest. Definitely the most enjoyable day he’s had this semester.

Harry’s fairly sure he’s the only half of the friendship that gets in over his head about specific things that he thinks may be hinting at how everything isn't alright between them. Literally the only thing that gets Harry to calm down a bit and realize that everything is peachy keen between him and Louis is that at the end of the day, when he’s making his way towards their locker and Louis seems to have just finished gathering his belongings and brushes past Harry in the opposite way, the boy flicks him off playfully on the way by. It’s truly special, the fact that a middle finger being flashed in his face is symbolic of peace in Harry’s life.

He really doesn’t know why he freaks out about the state of his and Louis’ friendship sometimes. There’s just been a lot of time and trust and other stupid, soft stuff put into that boy, which makes it easy for Harry to get carried away with slight panic every now and then.

So Harry just decides to chill the fuck out about it and let Louis decide when he wants Harry to be the center of his attention again.

He lets himself chill out for another day. And another day. And another day of only seeing each other briefly at their locker before Liam whisks him away with a playful chokehold or Jas beckons him with a flirtatious sing-songy call of his name (which is actually quite unbearable).

Harry doesn’t know why he finds himself lasting until Friday, but he does.

He ends up sat on the front steps of his house as the evening is nearing its end, nothing to do, and no hope that his phone will light up with anything worthwhile.

He can honestly say that the fact that Ezra still hasn’t messaged him has definitely added to his melancholy.

But right now, he’s rather peaceful…accepting, almost, as he stares at his phone where it sits in his lap and the sky is almost fully dark all around him. The weekend has come, he has no plans or duties, and only about two more weeks of classes after this. No reason not to be peaceful.

He can even hear the faint sounds of his mother starting up the laundry machine upstairs as the front door remains wide and open right behind him, only creaking slightly as the wind attempts to move it little by little.

His mother’s footsteps can be heard approaching not long after that, the sound of her momentary grunt making it clear to Harry that she’s probably hoisting a laundry basket upon her hip, full of clothes that are freshly washed and warmly dry.

“Did Louis a favor,” his mother says sweetly, Harry finding himself a bit confused as he quirks an eyebrow up and turns to look over his shoulder. There his mother is, holding out Louis’ warm-up sports jacket that he’d left upstairs in Harry’s bedroom ages ago. The both of them have almost fully forgotten about it by now; it really just goes to show how sly and smooth his mom is with picking up dirty laundry.

“Thanks,” Harry mumbles, holding out his hand in preparation for the jacket to be tossed at him.

“Haven’t seen the boy myself in a while,” she continues, sounding only slightly concerned as she hoists the basket on her hip again and Harry is back facing forward, hands halfheartedly toying with the polyester material of the jacket.

“He was just here.”

“I figured that after seeing how empty my Jack Daniel's bottle was.”

Harry barely winces as he closes his eyes, already dreading the way he’s going to have to endure his mother’s sigh and beating her to it. “Sorry. It was his last match.”

“That’s gonna be the last excuse you’ll get away with,” she replies, Harry’s previously tight lips now much more relaxed and smirking whilst his eyes continue to stare down at his phone. “Come inside soon, if you can. It’s getting dark.”

All Harry offers is a hum, not necessarily in agreement, but in understanding that he’s heard her request. He’s just not really ready to go inside yet. Not ready to succumb to the acceptance that this is really how his weekend is about to go, no second date with a seemingly sweet guy who’s been on his mind all week, not a surprise visit where Louis climbs into his bed and takes up most of the space as per usual. This is just not how his weekend is supposed to go. He knows it.

Nevertheless, his mother leaves him to his own company as he can hear her moving towards other places in the house, and he continues to spend his time blinking down at his black phone screen, hands still fiddling with the sports jacket that’s surprisingly quite satisfying to the touch.

And then it vibrates. Pretty much right at the exact moment Harry’s shifted his gaze away from it and decided to take notice of the regular stray cat across the street that roams the neighborhood.

Harry’s mighty quick in bringing his eyes back down to the device again, not knowing if what he sees is exactly what he’d wanted.

 **Louis:** _soccer field at 12?_

Another text comes in not long after it, Harry not even having fully registered the fact that this is something Louis wants to do at midnight.

 **Louis:** _wanna see if i can turn all the lights on_

This is what brings Harry to stop keeping his mouth somewhat open and his eyes wholeheartedly blank, now biting back a grin as he moves to text Louis back. They _are_ supposed to be doing everything, he guesses.

 **Harry:** _bring ur soccer ball_

He gets a response almost immediately to his immense enjoyment, since he’d been waiting for any type of meaningful interaction or hangout invitation for almost a week now.

 **Louis:** _oh reallyyy. ur on bitch_

And so it’s settled. Harry has plans for tonight.

Normally Harry would refute this idea several times before finally giving into Louis persistently telling him to stop worrying so much, but right now, Harry has understood that the promise of doing _everything_ comes with a complete abandonment of regular worries, doubts, and hesitancies.

Which is why, after falling asleep not much later (well, practically forcing himself asleep so he can be up at midnight), he’s waking up to the alarm he’d set on his phone, sliding out of bed noiselessly, and moving around his room for his shoes and keys with the most hushed maneuvers he can manage to make.

He genuinely feels like he’s a burglar in his own home with the way he’s trying to control even the huffs of his breathing as he pulls his sneakers upon his feet and prays his mother can’t hear anything from where her bedroom remains directly under his. There’d literally be no way to convince her that it makes sense to go out and do anything at this time of night.

He’s practically tiptoeing out through the front door after a long sequence of slow steps out of his bedroom and down the never-ending stairs, elongated reaching for different knobs and hallway corners, and significantly drawn-out closing of doors.

Everything is all the more frustrating when he remembers the fact that his car emits the absolute loudest most chaotic start-up sounds that would instantly get him caught due to his light-sleeper of a mother, so he ends up making the choice to instead grab his bike off of the lawn and pedal his way off of his front sidewalk in the dead of the night like some character off of _Stranger Things_.

Biking to the school, as opposed to driving, takes an abundantly higher amount of effort, though that’s something he could’ve known without actually testing it out.

Once his pedaling feet are slowing down upon reaching the vast parking lot outside of the soccer field (that’s particularly eerie this time of night), he can merely see the shadow of Louis in the distance, the boy’s back rested against the entrance gate to the field as it appears he’d been waiting.

The sweat upon Harry’s hairline, neck, and face has accumulated greatly as a result of the frivolous bike ride, and he doesn’t fail to let Louis know exactly that once he’s thrown his bike carelessly upon the pavement and is making his way toward the boy with skip-steps.

“I’m sweaty,” is the first thing he says, now possessing an increasingly closer view of Louis and finding that he’s definitely drinking out of a stainless steel flask every now and then. Just as they’d agreed on, he has his soccer ball tucked under his free arm, and he looks quite comfortable and snug in the giant hooded sweatshirt that gives him fingertip length sleeves.

“That you are,” Louis replies, wiping his lips with a fist after downing the contents of the flask. His words are just a bit unsure of themselves and slow coming out of his mouth. “Why didn’t you just take your car, you…you fuckin’ weirdo?”

“I snuck out, and my car is a loud piece of shit, we both know this,” Harry replies, taking a moment to heave just a bit as he comes to stand in front of him. “And fuck is that? How dare you get drunk without me?”

“You took too fucking long to get here,” Louis answers, the loose giggle he lets out confirming that Harry, indeed, took too fucking long to get here. He extends his arm straight out towards Harry, holding the drink out for him and still keeping the soccer ball comfy under his arm. “You can try it though.”

Harry takes the bait immediately, reaching for it, only for Louis to immediately move his arm upwards, as though Harry isn’t taller than him by miles and could still easily retrieve it. 

He doesn’t retrieve it right _away_ , however, because Louis has an advantage in how fast he’s able to move his arm around and duck out of Harry’s grasp just in time. It’s a very…weird situation, because as Louis’ continuing to wholeheartedly laugh and taunt Harry with this flask, it very much feels like the boy is teasing him like a middle school girl with a crush. Which is just not something that they do.

“Louis—stop, stop fucking—“ Harry grunts, taking control by seizing one of Louis' arms behind the boy's back, and reaching forth for the flask as far as he can. He snatches the flask in one swift motion before Louis can break out of his grasp, Louis verbally proclaiming that he “sucks” as he works in order to open the soccer field gate (which is dangerously and negligently unlocked).

Harry comes to discover that _whatever_ alcoholic concoction Louis has mixed in order to fill the contents of this flask is something truly horrid, because he’s pretty sure he’s never had anything go down his throat so roughly before, but he endures it, the main goal on his mind right now being that he wants to be as tipsy as Louis. More teasy play fights, please. Harry is really deprived.

As Louis’ running across the field toward the control center that’s (clearly) located atop the bleachers on the opposite end of the field, Harry can’t help but ponder what kind of punishment they’ll be receiving if they get caught. This has to be three days suspension in the least. It has to be.

But still, Harry doesn’t allow himself to delve too deep into those worries once Louis’ merely an ant from Harry’s point of view, up on top of the bleachers in the control room, and has presumably switched on a button in order to get every single light on.

It’s like something out of a movie, or like a dream, or something, the way all the lights framing the field come on, row by row, corner by corner, blinding and white as Harry is just now coming to terms with the fact that he’s standing in the middle of the field just about, Louis’ flask still in hand as his hand is limp by his side.

Harry’s feet rotate little by little as he twists in order to take in everything, feeling like he may actually be the only person that exists right now, with every light centered in on him like this.

The next thought his mind immediately flies to is the knowledge that Louis plays under scrutiny of these same lights at nearly every soccer match. He’s played under these lights for _years_ now, and he still remained one of the star players on the team for four seasons straight. Harry’s feeling the immense pressure of everyone’s attention on him right now and no one’s even _here_. So, just so he gets things straight; Louis plays under the weights of these deafening lights, the thunderous crowd that’s either cheering or booing given the circumstances, _and_ Harry flashing giant, mean signs at him from the stands. The boy is a trooper.

Harry makes a show of opening his arms wide and throwing his head back, letting the sensation of the luminous lights be felt behind his closed eyelids. He makes the mocking, breathy sounds of a fake crowd somehow existing in the bleachers, cheering him on for an achievement he hasn’t yet fabricated in his head.

The sound of Louis wholeheartedly clapping even from how far he is, along with him cupping his hands around his mouth and cheering Harry on for no reason at all as well, is what fuels Harry even more, smiling brightly and feeling like a very well accomplished professional athlete.

He opens his eyes as he makes a point to bow obnoxiously, not even being able to see Louis from where he stands but facing him nonetheless and raising his voice as much as needed. _“Thank you, thank you!"_

An additional amount of time is spent where Harry's simply ogling at the spacious environment encompassing him, everything surreal reflected back into his eyes, and the midnight sky especially gleaming up above him, and he finds himself only a tad bit out of his body during this whole moment.

He hasn’t even realized Louis’ exited the control room and jogged down the bleachers until the boy’s voice is heard relatively close to him, breathless and astounded. “This is so fucking cool.”

“Fuck yeah,” Harry replies, already feeling a bit of the heavy, disgusting drink he’d chugged a good portion of. He directs his wondrous, wide eyes to Louis instead, truly beside himself and genuinely curious. “How do you do this?”

“Whad’you mean?” Louis asks, gesturing for the flask and prompting Harry to toss it back to him.

“At every match. I feel like I’m under the world’s magnifying glass right now.”

Louis takes a moment to finish swallowing, burping into his fist only briefly whilst twisting the cap back on. “They’re just lights, Harry.”

“Well, yeah, but—“

“Are we gonna do this one on one or not?” Louis asks, letting the flask fall into his center pocket and positioning the dirty, withered and worn soccer ball between both hands. Harry can still remember when the boy’d first bought that thing, so excited to practice at home before he tried out for the soccer team. 

“I’m just waiting on you,” Harry replies, crossing his arms confidently. “But lights off, though.”

Louis’ mouth drops open for a moment, Harry almost completely unprepared for it, but still catching it between his palms when the boy throws the ball at his chest. “I jus’ turned them on.”

“And it’s not long before someone will notice that the fucking soccer field is lighting up the whole damn city,” Harry replies, before throwing the ball back at the boy. “Plus, I want an advantage by having the match in the dark.”

This seems to amuse Louis for some reason, the boy’s lips pulling upward on one side briefly as he rolls the ball around between both hands a bit, and Harry only takes a second or two to acknowledge that he hasn’t seen the boy’s face so brightly and in vivid detail, giving him his undivided attention like this in a while, far too long—he only acknowledges it for two seconds, then goes back to his previous, more casual state.

“Fine,” Louis replies, already moving back towards the bleachers and tossing the ball over his shoulder and onto the ground on the way there.

Harry’s convinced that over their years of playing these completely-for-fun one on one matches, he, himself, has improved greatly. He’d always secretly felt that if he’d tried for the soccer team at the beginning of this school year, he would’ve made it. But that’s a secret power for only him to know and bask in.

Louis should be able to tell anyway, because Harry steals the ball away from him a significant amount of times, Louis claiming it’s because Harry’s eyes adjust to the dark faster than his. Pfft, whatever. That’s definitely not a thing.

Harry just can’t help but think, as they’re tackling each other to the ground, drinking during “timeouts” that they call themselves, nearly doubled over in sweat and exhaustion due to having actual, outrageously faraway goals they need to score in order to get a point, that this is symbolic. Like, there has to be a reason that they’ve had so many lazy, nothing soccer matches in Louis’ backyard, Harry’s backyard, the school gymnasium, this very soccer field during lunch (using only a tiny corner of the field due to the capacity of students using it for other things), and _now_ , they have a whole, real, gigantic soccer field completely to themselves. This is their last match. It has to be. Neither of them knows it yet, but this is the grand finale of their amateur matches, long ago kick started by Louis trying to convince Harry soccer _wasn’t_ stupid and meaningless in their freshman year and that Harry should let him teach him how to play.

They’re both too off of their shit in an alcohol haze to even be aware that no one has made a score. All they begin to know at some point is that they should steal the ball, and kick it across the field as long as they possibly can before the other boy steals it right back. It becomes sort of an endless repeat that they don’t even realize is happening. Nor do they care, because they’re just having so much darn fun. Harry’s even forgotten it’s almost two a.m. Is his mom looking for him right now, on the verge of calling the police to report a missing child? Who _knows_. Who _cares_.

A good portion of both of their articles of clothing are stained with dirt and grass by now, especially when they find themselves having tripped over one another for probably the hundredth time and are finally too lazy to get up.

“I can’t…I fucking can’t with you,” Harry huffs breathlessly, not even knowing why he’s laughing so hard as they remain limp on the dryly mudded ground after a completely stupid and unorganized soccer match. Harry’s face is practically buried in the grass, and Louis’ strewn on top of him, weighing his back down and clearly making no attempts to move. Harry doesn’t even know where the ball is anymore.

“What?” Louis asks, inching forward and shifting position in order to catch a glimpse of Harry’s face. “Form adherent sentences, please, sir.”

“Adherent isn’t a word,” Harry replies, not being able to fully meet eyes with Louis from his position but turning his gaze towards him as much as he can. 

“Aren’t you the one that lost the tenth grade spelling bee?” Louis asks, shoving himself up and off of Harry as he wholeheartedly continues to chuckle, Harry now very much serious and void of humor.

“Hey, _hey_ , joking about that is off limits,” Harry replies, rolling over and moving to sit up with his eyebrows knit and unamused. “You know that was really serious to me.”

Louis doesn’t seem to care that this _is_ , indeed, something they’d agreed not to joke about, the boy’s lips quivering as he breathes and huffs his words out as best he can, sitting up just adjacent to Harry and only seen as an outlined shadow in the dark. “You really lost trying to spell—“

“Nope, no _stop_ ,” Harry begins, bringing both hands to cover his ears. “Louis, for real.”

He can still hear the boy however, despite the plugging of his ears, although it doesn’t seem like he’s finished what he’s saying, and has instead opted to reprimand Harry for blocking him out.

“Don’t—don’t cover your ears on me, Harry,” the boy begins, Harry soon after feeling the boy’s hands prying at where his own hands remain over his ears. “You know I hate that…don’t tune me out. I won’t say it anymore.”

“You were just about to say it,” Harry responds, both of their words running over each other as Louis has successfully wrestled Harry’s hands away from his ears and is now just about kneeled next to him. “Of course, it’s always what _you_ want that’s more important than what I want.”

“Is _not_.”

“Is _too_.”

“I agreed to do this match in the dark, remember?” Louis begins, still tightly holding onto both of Harry’s forearms as he hovers near him, eyes slightly droopy. “ _And_ I let you steal the ball from me like three times—“

“You did not _let_ me!” Harry shouts just a little louder than he needs to, now back in a laughing mood and completely forgetting what this back and forth had initially been about. “You did fucking _not!”_

“I _did!”_ Louis yells back, his volume just as uncalled for and echoing whilst his hands are shaking Harry by the arms. “I do things for you all the _time_ —just admit that I’m the greatest best friend like, ever. In all existence.”

“Well, you only hang out with me when you feel like it. Never when _I_ feel like it,” Harry says, the words coming out of his mouth easily and naturally, even though it’s pretty…heavy right now. Especially right in the midst of a generally lighthearted disagreement. He can tell in the way they’re both a little more settled for a moment, simply breathing in and out, still from the match or from just having gotten finished scuffling over nothing, and they’re just…quiet. But still staring at each other. And attached at Harry’s forearms.

Harry’s mind is drunk on honesty right now, it seems, which is why he goes the extra mile after neither of them have said anything for a while. “Especially this semester, kinda.” He swallows just a bit, not knowing why he’s feeling just a bit ruffled now that he’s let these things out. It’s not like they haven’t addressed their occasional concerns in their relationship before, it just feels a bit more…weird right now. And Harry has no idea why.

Suddenly, Louis’ releasing his arms and instead reaching for his shirt, fiercely jerking the boy forward in one sloppy motion as he falls back onto his own ass, Harry severely thrown aback and not understanding what’s happening right now, but just knowing his face is significantly near to Louis’.

“What?” Harry asks, voice hushed and eyes huge as Louis grips his shirt, a chunk of material in both fists.

“You and this fuckin’ shirt,” Louis replies, shoving the boy away hastily and leaving Harry to stumble back onto his ass, brows creased as he takes genuine offense.

“My shirt?” Harry asks, looking down disappointedly at the stripes he’d always admired. “My mom _loves_ this shirt! I thought you did too.”

Louis has his arms crossed over his chest as he looks almost in a completely different direction, resembling that of a moody toddler as he sits with his legs extended out in front of him, sweat beading down his nose from the recent match. “I do.”

Harry hadn’t really been planning to react in any fashion, but before he can even get a chance to, Louis’ digging into the center pocket of his hoodie for the flask, Harry’s eyes slow and blinking as he simply watches him gulp down a good amount of it. He wipes his mouth with his oversized sleeve once he’s finished making a face, blindly tossing the thing at Harry at the same time that a burp escapes his mouth, Harry barely catching it in time.

Harry downs as much of it as he can manage, even though it’s absolutely disgusting. Seriously, where does Louis even get this stuff? He’d much rather get in trouble sneaking into his mother’s cabinet.

Louis sniffles only twice as he seamlessly moves to lay on his back, hair rested against the dirty grass and eyes facing upward, quite literally gazing at the stars as he toys with his hands. Not a care in the world, that boy. Harry can hardly even deal with grass in his hair and the thought of bugs crawling into his ear and yet this simple thing, Louis just did in the moment without even giving it much thought.

So Harry does it too.

He leaves the flask off to the side as he moves to lay down too, a good amount of space between him and Louis as their bodies almost angle away from each other, both of their heads being the parts of themselves that are the closest as they look up, spinning in the heads and overly dazed. 

Harry’s seriously never noticed how visible and…pretty the stars are from this field, which is crazy, because by now he’s attended numerous soccer matches on this field, helped set up after school festivals on this field, snuck out to this field to escape prom with a few people. It’s really something he should’ve stopped to look at a while before now.

He doesn’t mind that it’s happening now though. What better way for him to finally admire this view than with his partner in crime, completely quiet and not being awkward because of it, right at the end of the school year where they’ll probably never even step foot in this field again. Maybe they were meant to just enjoy it at this very moment.

“You know…” Harry begins, closing his eyes briefly as he takes a moment to breathe the fresh air. “It’s wild, how there isn’t any other person on earth I could do this with.”

Louis remains mute at the mouth, only the sounds of his breathing accompanying Harry as they keep their glazed eyes focused directly upward, Harry almost beginning to experience living among the stars. Like nothing else exists around them besides the vastness of outer space.

Yeah, he’s really drunk.

“Like, just silence, like this,” Harry continues. “Risky, stupid shit like this.”

Louis emits a loaded huff from his mouth, Harry rolling his head over to watch the boy’s profile. “And so it begins with Sentimental Harry. Remind me to stop letting you drink.”

Harry doesn’t hesitate to aggressively shove the boy’s shoulder in response (“would it _kill_ you to be sentimental for just one moment, you jerk”), Louis being taken aback by it as his mouth opens and he finally directs his gaze toward Harry. This immediately gets Harry’s face mushed and shoved out of Louis’ space, which causes Harry to retaliate by doing what he knows Louis hates—poking him right in his neck where it tickles most.

Louis’ shoulders jump with it right before he’s slapping Harry’s hands away. “You _know_ I fucking hate that!”

This results in even more shoving, Harry and his drunken mind already having forgot about what started this little scuffle in the first place as he kicks at one of the boy’s calves and Louis’ roughing up his shirt with those same tiny fists that Harry’s always been amused by. There’s a lot of laughter involved in the little fighting match anyway, both of them not taking any of this even halfway seriously and doing a good job of summarizing pretty much what most of their high school journey of being glued into each other's sides has consisted of: hateful adoration, if that makes sense.

And then they’re close.

And Harry doesn’t even know how it _happened_.

Just, one moment he’s trying to get his fingers into the crook of Louis’ neck again whilst the boy is cursing at him, and then another moment, the boy still has a fist in his shirt and their faces are merely inches apart. 

Close. Way too close. And way too quiet now.

Louis still has a fist curled in the material of his shirt, right at the chest as their giggles die down and they focus solely on each other’s eyes, and it simply _feels_ pretty obvious where this should go now. Harry’s drunk mind is thinking entirely too simple in—cute boy, close cute boy, kiss close cute boy.

It also appears Louis’ mind is being just as simple too. Because the boy’s eyes are sliding closed as they’re now completely silent, almost as though the boy is dozing off, even though he isn’t, he definitely _isn’t_ because his fist grips Harry’s shirt just a little tighter, not pulling him in but just making it clear that he’s _awake_ and _sure_ of what he’s doing.

So Harry lets his eyes fall shut too.

All he can do is try his best not to shudder his breath as he’s leaning in, taking charge of it since it doesn’t appear that Louis is going to take any of the initiative.

Once their foreheads are coming to gently press against one another, something hot flashes over Harry, and he opens his eyes, watchful of how Louis still has his closed, his lips slightly parted as though he’s just…waiting.

“Open your eyes,” Harry says, keeping his voice low so as not to puncture the little bubble they’re in right now.

Louis’ voice is at only a slight level above a whisper when he speaks. “Why?”

“So you can register what we’re about to do.”

It isn’t a surprise when Louis doesn’t listen to him, because when has the boy ever been known to do anything except exactly what he wants to do in any given moment? All he does is keep his eyes blissfully closed and press his forehead into Harry’s some more, the whiffs of his hair lulling Harry right back into closing his eyes and bridging the gap between them.

When their lips meet, oddly enough, it’s not weird. It feels like a kiss. Harry honestly doesn’t know what he’d expected it to feel like. Maybe he’d expected it to feel like hot lava that would sting his tongue and immediately send him flying backwards and realizing he Never Should’ve Done That but no, it feels like a real, genuine kiss, and for that reason, the both of them don’t make any efforts to stop.

Only after a few moments does Louis use the grip he has on Harry’s shirt to pull him in some more, Harry finding himself half on top of Louis as the boy is laid on his back, one hand against his chest and the other one faintly grazing his elbow.

It’s really tender, the kiss that they’re sharing right now; Harry has one thigh pressed in between Louis’ legs, which is simply a result of the position they’re in, but he makes no move to start up any friction, seeing as the pure, innocent level of their moistened lips moving over each other doesn’t seem to call for it. He can hardly even graze the boy’s tongue as he lets one of his hands cradle within the boy’s hair, almost not even being able to tell it apart from the grass he’s rested in.

When it ends, their heads only linger together for a second or two longer, Harry, of course, blinking himself back to life as he purses his lips and takes his fingers out of Louis’ hair.

“That was…” he begins, growing unable to make any other words materialize.

“Weird,” Louis answers, eyes still closed as he knits his brows together. 

Harry’s already slowly letting himself off from his position over Louis, emitting one of his stupid nervous laughs—squeak and _all_ —that always show up at the perfectly wrong times. “Not normal. Like at all.”

“Yeah. Super weird.”

“Definitely, uh—“ Harry begins, scratching his head as he moves to sit up. “Let’s just…let’s not—“

“Yeah, never again,” Louis responds as he sits up as well.

Harry agrees quickly with a “never again”, his knees being brought up close to his chest.

Remember literally like five minutes ago when Harry’d said he’d enjoyed how he could sit in silence with Louis and it wouldn’t be awkward? Yeah, he’d definitely spoken way too soon.

Because the mere five second silence that follows is _excruciating_. Harry’s gaze is unfocused and positioned down upon the grass, not even daring to take a peek at Louis’ facial expression. Truly excruciating.

“Well, um—“ Harry starts, lifting a hand and speaking just a bit too loudly for the fact that there’s literally _no_ other sound within a five mile radius right now. “We _are_ , ya know…doing everything.” He forces the most genuine laugh he can muster as he curls his arms around his knees, being very steady with it in order to ensure he doesn’t squeak again. “Can cross that off the list, I guess.”

“Yeah,” Louis replies faintly, not even attempting a laugh. Nervous laughter was never really his style.

And then there’s more silence.

It’s so _awkward_. Harry really wants to slice himself in half right about now. He should probably call Louis a dumbass, or something. To restore the natural order of things. Or would that just feel too forced? God, they definitely weren’t drunk enough for this.

Someway, somehow, although it’d seemed absolutely impossible at the moment, Harry powers through the awkwardness that ensues from thereon, Louis eventually jogging off to retrieve his ball where it’d been left on the field, before both of them are journeying toward the gate, side by side, step crunching in the grass after step, Louis holding the ball between his two palms with the flask back in his hoodie pocket.

“See you around,” is the first thing Louis says once Harry’s closed the gate behind them, only a street light far in the distance barely aiding Harry in even being able to see the boy.

Without thinking, Harry’s replying with a “yeah, g’night”, not even giving a thought as to where the boy may even be going as Louis now walks across the parking lot in a completely opposite direction from where Harry'd came, despite how he literally lives just a few blocks from Harry. Harry just lets him walk, all the while scratching behind his ear and feeling almost completely sober now. He’d really needed this sudden sobriety to come at a much earlier convenience, though.

He just turns around on his heel, itching a whole into his head as he starts toward where he’d laid his bike against the concrete of the parking lot, figuring Louis knows exactly where he’s going and doesn’t need Harry breathing down his neck. 

Or into his mouth.

What the fuck.


	4. Chapter 4

“I know this moment,” Zayn perks up, Louis nonreactive to it due to the fact that Zayn abruptly sits up and proclaims things like this quite often.

Louis just sits there, in his usual spot in the very back corner of precal class, unknowingly tapping his pencil against the desk and halfheartedly offering a hum to Zayn in order to let him know he’s listening. He has his textbook out open in front of him, as does Zayn, as do the few other people he regularly talks to in this back right corner of the room who also do not care about the subject of math in the slightest. The open textbooks are excellent for making them seem like they’re at least somewhat engaged in the class.

“Like…this…moment. Right now,” Zayn continues, sounding stupefied as he gestures slowly and wildly. He then snaps his eyes to where Louis is tapping his pencil against the desk, which brings Louis to actually _realize_ that he’s tapping his pencil against the desk. “Like, you doing _that_ , Mr. Rush talking about equations in the background—“

“It’s called déjà vu, idiot,” Mike says, turning around in his seat where he sits directly in front of them, Sandra stifling her guffaws into her bushy hair.

Zayn quickly points at Mike, way too fascinated for his own good. “You saying that _too_.”

“ _Zayn_ ,” comes Mr. Rush’s voice, clearly raised an octave from when he was previously performing his boring lecture.

When Zayn’s huge, blinking puppy eyes have to direct themselves toward the front of the room, Mr. Rush seems more than pleased with how he’s caught the boy off guard. “Sir?”

“Maybe you can try your hand at the equation on the board.”

Louis internally weeps for the boy, even though the equation that’s written across the front board in blue dry erase marker is an especially easy one. It’s just that even in his short time of knowing the boy, Zayn has never been mathematically gifted. Or educationally gifted in general. Louis doesn’t even know how he got into this class. Maybe Louis’ set him behind a bit, keeping him in this back corner to socialize and completely tune out the teacher’s existence for each and every class.

Just as expected, Zayn stammers and stutters over a simple equation on the board that involves the use of the PEMDAS order of operations, the boy even taking a moment to not-so-discreetly whisper to those around him, much to a lot of the class’ amusement as stifled and choked down laughter can be heard if Louis listens closely enough. Zayn does manage to successfully get the equation figured out in his notebook and proudly voiced out loud after a good amount of time however, after all is said and done.

“Dude, that’s like, junior high math,” Louis says, after Mr. Rush has accepted Zayn’s correct answer with a sigh of failure and has gone back to lecturing the class.

“I didn’t pay attention in junior high,” Zayn replies, slumping back in his desk as though the mental power of such a math problem has drained the life out of him.

“'Course you didn’t.”

“I can say though…” Zayn begins, pursing his lips for a moment. “I did _not_ see that coming in my déjà vu vision.”

While Mike can be seen shaking with amusement in front of them some more, and Sandra once again nearly suffocating herself with her hair as she laughs behind it, Louis offers a half-amused hum, now having significantly decreased his pencil tapping.

Zayn suddenly perks up again, this time being much more chill about it so as not to acquire any more of Mr. Rush’s attention. “You know something else I _didn’t_ see coming though,” he begins, voice hushed as his eyes are now focused on Louis’, big and brown and fairly unrelenting.

Louis makes a small noise of question, feeling just a sprinkled tremor in his chest in response to the pure, almost knowing focus of Zayn’s gaze right now.

“It’s something about _you_ ,” he continues, voice even more hushed now, and quickly bringing Louis to wonder what it is that has to be so secretive.

He hasn’t even realized he’s begun viciously tapping his pencil again.

“What?” Louis asks, doing his utmost to keep his exterior appearance unperturbed and collected.

“Don’t act like you don’t know,” Zayn replies, cocking his head to the side and starting to look unconvinced.

“I…” Louis begins, shrugging one shoulder and looking away for only half a moment. “I don’t know.”

There’s a long pause that ensues, Louis genuinely not knowing (or at least…assuming he doesn’t know) what the hell Zayn is referring to right now as they just hold each other’s eyes, the boy almost too close for comfort. 

Then, he speaks again finally, and even with the outrageous nature of what he says, Louis is overcome with a great sense of alleviation.

“You and Jas,” Zayn begins, shaking around Louis’ shoulder a bit and hardly even producing sound with his lips anymore. He practically mouths his next words. “You know… _knocking her up_.”

All Louis does in response to that is press his lips closed and shake his head slowly, not quite knowing how to express how immensely, extravagantly, vastly _wrong_ the boy is. He just continues to shake his head, truly feeling that no words can suffice for how much that is simply not the case, and never will be.

Zayn eventually shakes his own head along with him, as though he doesn’t understand this exchange. “Why are you shaking your head?” Zayn asks, voice raised to a more appropriate level now as his hand remains heavy on Louis’ shoulder.

“Because that’s not true,” Louis replies, eyes tired and low as he’s already growing over the fact that other people may be thinking this as well. “Definitely one of the lesser informed rumors I’ve heard about myself.”

Zayn looks thoroughly disappointed in the face in response to this, his hand sliding off of Louis’ t-shirt and his brows furrowing. “It’s not true?”

Louis shrugs at himself as he looks down at his textbook. “I mean, if _she_ is, that’s none of my business,” he replies, before chewing on his lip for a moment, simply thinking about how crazy that would be if actually true. “But definitely no fault on _this_ end, buddy.”

“Ugh. Really?” Zayn asks, the negative tone of voice bringing Louis to shoot a subtle glare his way, eyebrows down low as he tries to understand this reaction.

“Why do you sound so miserable about me not getting a girl pregnant?”

“It was just really juicy, is all,” Zayn replies, Louis rolling his eyes at the boy as he moves to slump in his seat, taking notice of how that blonde boy at the very front of the class turns his head over his shoulder briefly to stare at them. Probably to communicate to them that they need to shut up. It’s that guy—that guy that Harry hangs out with sometimes. Niall, Louis somewhat remembers his name to be. Pretty much his favorite thing to do in this class is occasionally look over his shoulder at him and Zayn as though they’re disturbing the class, or something.

But today, the fleeting look from the boy feels a little different. Or maybe it’s not different, and it’s just Louis who perceives it differently. He simply finds himself swallowing nothing down his throat in response to it, not exactly sure if Zayn had said something else next to him or not, due to the way everything around Louis seems to go cloudy for just a moment. Bordering on panicked, actually, which is a lot for Louis to admit. Because Niall’s eyes are a bit more inquisitive, even as they curiously stare behind those thick eyeglasses he sports all the time. As though, he like…knows something.

Louis swallows the feeling again, figuring over-thinking about something so trivial is nothing other than idiotic and useless.

“Rumors are so stupid,” he huffs under his breath, slumping down significantly further in his seat.

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

Louis’ once again having to endure one of the many torturous student assemblies that this school has to offer, all of which are boring, stupid, and also boring. 

He’s beyond grateful that this is the last one he’ll ever have to attend, though. Like, ever.

So he endures it as best he can, with most of his friends surrounding him as they take their usual place in the back of the senior section amongst the auditorium seats, Jas on his right as she sits next to him, curls into his side, and allows Louis to keep an arm comfortably around her.

He hasn’t said anything to her about the rumor. For several reasons, actually.

A huge part of him doesn’t actually believe it, but still, he has a mild worry that she might lash out or something if he simply asks. Girls are strange and wildly unpredictable sometimes, Louis feels.

He also understands that it may be none of his business if it _is_ true, and so that should basically be the end of the back and forth going on in his head. He’ll just glaze his eyes over during this school-wide assembly as they give out pointless awards to students with easy achievements, and he’ll keep her close to his side where she clearly likes to stay, the girl occasionally taking whiffs of his neck and playing with his mussed hair.

“Oh god, look at that,” she says after a while, Louis being able to hear her over the general murmur of students not paying attention to the rewards being given onstage only because she’s right up against his ear. 

Her words are quickly followed by a bunch of muted snickering, Louis following her eyes up to the stage, where it appears that none other than the school mascot seems to be accepting a ribbon and plaque for “Best Mascot Ever”. Although the lion costume is fully on, complete with the massive animal head, everyone is pretty knowledgeable of who lies under it, which is probably why it seems all the more funny to the senior class as some cheer him on mockingly, some cheer him on sincerely, and many find it quite amusing.

It’d be…something, if the boy took off the lion head. Louis hasn’t seen his face in a while. The boy didn’t even come to their locker this morning, which may not even mean anything, because Louis simply just might’ve missed him, but still. It’s very strange, having the first time he sees Harry today be from the audience below and way far back, the boy wearing a lion costume.

Louis doesn’t laugh or even smirk like the rest of them, simply choosing to chew on the inside of his cheek as he watches the boy get handed the plaque by the principal of the school. He really doesn’t understand how it’s funny.

“These awards are so fucking stupid,” he hears Liam mutter behind him, followed by mumbles of agreement and how it “wastes everyone’s time”.

It’s after the assembly when everyone gets dismissed to spend their lunchtime however they please, although a lot of students still remain right in the auditorium, loitering around and too lazy to get a move on towards the cafeteria and all of its disgusting cuisine.

Liam and Zayn are in the middle of their third round of arm wrestling, everyone surrounding them quite engaged and noisy as it happens, when of course, things are quieted down just a bit upon the approach of someone into their messy bubble of slacking off.

“Hey um…” comes his voice before Louis actually sees him, the boy seeming out of character with how timid he sounds as he steps up. Once he comes into view, it’s apparent that he’s a bit red in the face from the lion head, which is now tucked under his thick bushy arm, and his hair is just a bit unkempt behind the scarf he usually wears, complete with strands sticking to him with sweat in different areas of his forehead. Louis remains in the same position with his arm around Jas, the girl’s head having been fully snuggled into his neck for a while now and Louis innocently blinking up at him to await what he has to say.

“I just wanted to ask, like, if you’d borrowed my science book from the locker,” the boy begins, scratching behind his neck for a moment (even though he has giant lion paws). “Because I kind of need it…for the open book test in class.”

Louis actually takes a moment to think on that, because honestly, he remembers taking the boy’s book at some point, but hasn’t thought about it in a while. It’s still significantly more silent than it’d previously been, Liam and Zayn just _now_ going back to their quieter arm wrestling match as Louis purses and plays around with his lips.

“I actually think I might’ve lent it to Carter Thornton,” Louis answers once it finally comes to him. “Sorry.”

Harry’s shoulders drop, Louis finally feeling the familiarity of how the boy would normally respond to him in a situation like this. “Really? How thoughtful of you.”

“Dude, all you have to do is hunt him down. I’m sure he’s in the cafeteria somewhere.”

“Yeah, but I shouldn’t have to hunt down a book that’s _mine—_ “

“Excuse me, excuse me,” comes the hurried, jolly voice of a person Louis can already instantly identify as Madeline, the enthusiastic girl on the yearbook committee. She’s making her way up to the group with a camera hanging around her neck, her short black hair pulled back into a high ponytail as usual, and her smile stretching for miles. Louis can sense how silently agitated Liam is getting by the accumulation of what he calls “nobodies” infiltrating their social circle.

She lifts the camera that’s hanging around her neck into the air, looking straight at Louis as she speaks, fully blocking the previous view he had of Harry. “You guys ready to take pictures for your superlative?”

The blank, confused way Louis simply stares at her and doesn’t say anything seems to get the point across, the girl’s face dropping just a bit as she takes a step back and looks between Louis and Harry.

“Oh…you guys don’t know you won one of the superlatives?” she asks reluctantly.

“Which one?” Liam asks, just a tad judgy in tone as a reluctant Zayn now awaits his wrestling hand to come back up and meet his.

“Most Likely To Grow Old Together, of course!” she says, her mood right back cheery as she continues to hold the camera up. “We can take your picture for the yearbook when you’re ready.”

Louis emits a round of breath from his lips, not having the capacity for many things right now, like thinking about the fact that people actually voted for them to win this thing, along with the fact that it’s smack in the middle of a time where he and Harry have hardly even looked at each other in days. Louis’ never even been one to care about things like these, anyway.

“Not really into it, honestly,” Louis replies after a while, shrugging one shoulder and only briefly looking for whether Harry’s expression says the same. His is unreadable, but definitely not one that looks very much satisfied.

“Yeah, it’s corny yearbook stuff,” Liam mutters, which seems to get Madeline’s facial expression to fall even more than it already had been, the girl letting go of the camera as it now swings from around her neck again.

Harry seems to quickly pick things up, however, setting one of his lion paws on her shoulder in order to appease her a bit. “I think senior superlatives are awesome. It’s really cool, the fact that we got voted. Thanks for letting us know.”

This appears to ease her just a little, the girl grinning from ear to ear again in response to someone at least giving her validation that the yearbook committee is appreciated. “It’s fine. I’ll just take pictures of whoever got second place!”

And then she’s gone with her apologies and her promises to leave them alone, and the last thing Harry is uttering is a disheartened, almost stale “bye” before turning around to leave the auditorium, lion head still firmly tucked under his arm.

Louis can’t help but sense that Harry is mad about something. And not in just the regular way that he’s agitated by Louis for at least ten minutes every day. It’s as though Louis is legitimately…bothering him, for a reason Louis can’t figure out. 

It’s all in the “bye”.

It’s an inkling that even causes Louis to faintly bite at his fingers as he watches Harry leave out of the auditorium through the open double doors. Biting his nails isn’t even something that Louis _does_ , which is why he quickly brings himself to stop once he realizes it’s exactly what he’s doing.

Maybe he’s looking too much into it.

They’d had a fun night that Friday, and then they hadn’t seen or even as much as texted each other until today in the auditorium, and Harry just happened to seem a touch more hostile than usual. That’s probably just how he’s feeling today. And Louis’ just going to go with that.

He doesn’t let it bother him any further as the day goes on, because he’s more than certain that at the end of the day, right at their locker, there the boy will be, telling him about his miserable love life and asking if they can carpool tomorrow.

Except he’s not.

He just…never comes to his locker. And the boy still has things in it that he probably needs, so what’s the deal?

Maybe he doesn’t need to though, seeing as today is the day the senior class has designated for staying after school in order to conduct senior pranks for the rest of the student body to be surprised by tomorrow morning. Since everyone’s staying at school late, the boy has a bunch of time to visit his locker if he needs to.

Louis will go with that.

And Harry seems fine. Harry’s always been keen on weaving his way in and out of different social groups, never having a definite one to lean on or tie himself to, and it can be seen quite clear as he’s at a different place within the school every hour, sometimes outside spray painting the front lawn with the cheerleaders, in the main hallways hanging stringy neon paper from the ceiling with his folks from drama club, or covering doorways with saran wrap with people who fall into the more miscellaneous category. Harry’s always just been an _everywhere_ kind of guy. And he seems perfectly fine, from what Louis can see as he halfheartedly tries to pitch in with all of the pranking himself by sprinkling glitter on the floor every now and then.

He just doesn’t understand why they aren’t _talking._

Louis has somewhat been able to see him from a distance throughout this entire evening, even faintly hearing him scream-laugh about something when he and Jas have fucked off into a corner on the third floor to make out discreetly for a few moments, but he guesses Harry isn’t paying attention to making sure of where Louis is at. And he _definitely_ isn’t making an effort to talk to him, share some of the cheerleader gossip with him, come to him with ideas for a secret side prank they can do on their own.

Louis is a man of space. Wouldn’t it make sense for him, as the master of all things in solitude, in keeping chill, in not jumping to conclusions, to give Harry whatever separation he clearly needs right now? He’s sort of being a hypocrite, honestly.

So Louis goes by that reasoning in his head for the rest of the night. Yes, _night_ , because the prank set-up activities happen to run for quite a long, ridiculous amount of time, the sky dark all around them once it finally seems they’re almost done, now simply loitering upon the front steps outside and lollygagging before they have to go home.

Louis’ reached a point of draining tiredness where he conducts his conversations and movements on autopilot, finding himself with one foot propped up on the last step outside in front of the school as he talks with a few of the folks from his baking class last year, the ones he got to make fruit pies with. He doesn’t get to talk with them much, but he really enjoys them.

He’s in the middle of answering one of their questions about how the prank in the library turned out when a strange occurrence takes place.

“Yeah, it was pretty—“

“ _Louis William Tomlinson!”_

The sheer demanding loudness of Louis’ _full name_ being spoken out loud quickly has Louis’ shoulders jumping and his eyes going wide behind the sunglasses he’s slipped on over them, but he doesn’t even get to fully register the mere happening of such a loud shout of his name before his right bicep is being gripped and he’s being viciously ripped away from the group of people he’d been talking with. 

“Hey, _hey_ ,” Louis gripes as Harry continues to pull him as far away from most of the school front yard commotion as possible, his facial features stern and his grip unmoving. Once it seems Harry’s finally coming to a stop, Louis makes a point of yanking his arm out of the boy’s possessive fist and rolling his shoulder out.

“You know, I’m not really a ‘drag me along’ kinda guy—“

“Tell me this isn’t true,” Harry says harshly. The pure frigidity of his unrelenting furrowed brows and stone cold expression has Louis simmering little by little, not even being able to remember the last time he’d seen Harry be this serious about anything. And he doesn’t even know what the boy is attacking him _about_.

Louis’ mouth is open for a few moments before he says anything, his hand scratching uselessly at his opposite arm.

“What exactly—“

“Fucking—just tell me this isn’t true, tell me you aren’t this _stupid_.” His voice increases in emotion with every word, Louis quickly beginning to grow annoyed by the fact that he's still completely in the dark about this entire ambush.

“For being friends with you?” Louis fires back, followed by a sarcastic shrug of his shoulders. “Someone who attacks me for no fucking reason? Probably so.”

“I’m talking about _Jas_ ,” Harry just about spits, eyes like glass as he takes one step closer to the boy. “Why would you _do_ this Louis—why would you throw your life away so early, make such a _stupid_ mistake—“

“Wait—“

“You’re not even _close_ to being ready for this—“

It very much feels like as soon as Louis realizes what it is Harry is spazzing out about, his entire demeanor goes from defensive and irate to completely amused and baffled, and he already knows Harry doesn’t take it very well when Louis suddenly bursts into giggles, bent over halfway with a hand over his stomach.

“Oh god,” Louis huffs in between his tiny bouts of laughter.

Harry’s facial expression accurately communicates the fact that he’s torn between being confused and genuinely wanting to punch Louis in the face. Louis’ most definitely never seen him look like this before. Like, the boy might _actually_ punch him in the face.

Harry’s voice is brought back down to a much lower, and somehow even angrier level. “What exactly is funny about that?”

“What’s funny about that is that it isn’t _true_ , idiot.”

Just like that, the wrinkles forming on Harry’s face and the creases cemented between his brows disappear, his lips parting momentarily as it finally dawns on him, the fact that he’d been so dumb as to let a simple _rumor_ rile him up this much. One would think the boy hadn’t been in high school ever in his life.

“It’s…” Harry begins, taking one step back and allowing Louis some more of his precious space, eyes now focused on the toes of both of their shoes. “It’s not true.”

Louis shrugs one shoulder as he stretches out his collar. “I mean, shit, it might be true for _her_ , I have no idea. Either way, I wouldn’t be…responsible, so it has nothing to do with me.”

Harry’s face twists back up with skepticism, the boy still not possessing the ability to bring some humor into his voice for god’s sake. “ _Nothing_ to do with you?”

“Yeah, that’s what I said. Are you deaf?”

“How could you be so sure, Lou?”

“ _Because_. We haven’t…” Louis begins, starting his rebuttal off way too confidently and loudly (judging by the few eyes that turn in their direction with interest). He mumbles his next few words, his eyes closed behind the lenses, although no one would be able to see them anyway. “I haven’t, like…done that.”

 _This_ is what gets every trace of unsmiling determination to wipe itself off of Harry’s face as his lips part even more than before, his eyebrows raising to a slight degree and his words becoming much more whispered.

“Um…what?”

Louis just sighs heavily, before starting off in the direction of his car that he spots in the distant parking lot, not even having to say anything in order to get the point across to Harry that he should follow him.

So that’s how they eventually find themselves in their familiar positions in the driver and passenger seat of Louis’ car, Louis well aware that at this point they’ve shared many weird, quiet conversations in this setting, sat exactly like this as the student body continued to parade around them.

It’s no different now, Louis poking at the Hawaiian dancer on his dashboard as he casually lets Harry in on a minor detail of his sex life that he's never straightforwardly declared before.

“Never?” Harry asks eventually, the boy literally gripping onto his backpack for dear life whilst it sits in his lap.

“Never.”

Harry’s eyes have an unhinged energy behind them as he stares forth without any real point of focus, as though millions of thoughts are running through his mind, which Louis can’t really blame him for. He’s so god damn dramatic.

“But…but you’re a _ladies' man_ and you’ve got someone different on your hip every few weeks and I’m your _best friend_ how could I not fucking know this?” the boy asks, nearly out of breath as he speaks rapidly.

Louis doesn’t say anything, instead offering half a hum and barely a curve of his lips in response to Harry’s dramatics, although he’s mostly concentrated on the little Hawaiian dancer swaying her hips all funny-like.

Harry continues anyway, as he always has and always will, even when Louis isn’t meeting even half his level of seriousness. “What about prom night? With Leah? _Nothing?”_

Louis shrugs, giving the Hawaiian dancer one last poke before moving back to recline against his seat, blowing air out of his puffed cheeks. “We cuddled at her place afterward. I literally told you that.”

“Yeah, but I thought that was code for—“

“It wasn’t code for anything. Since when do we have codes?” Louis wonders tonelessly, a one second chuckle falling from his lips.

“Stop being _jokey_ about this,” Harry replies, appearing genuinely distressed as he heaves. “You talk about having them spend the night, you literally ditch me because of it, you talk about _hooking up—“_

“Yeah,” Louis begins, sucking his teeth just a bit as he thinks of how he’s going to continue. “There are…you know, like…other ways to ‘hook up’ besides—“

“Okay, okay I get it,” Harry interrupts, putting a hand up and looking fiercely down at his backpack. “I regret asking. Don’t need the mental image.”

Louis has the side of his head rested against the cushion of the seat as he watches Harry look so frustrated and caved in on himself, and all because of what? Because Louis hasn’t stuck his dick in a girl and is a society-proclaimed “virgin”? Is this seriously why the boy’s world is falling apart?

“Why are you on my case anyway?” Louis asks tiredly. “It’s not like you’ve done it either.”

“Well you knew that already,” Harry replies, meeting eyes with the boy. “I complain about my love life literally every day.”

“Unfortunately,” Louis mutters.

“Which reminds me—“

“Of course,” Louis sighs, rolling his head the other way and looking out the window at the other students making their way to their cars to embark on the end of their day and Harry sounds like he’s digging into his pocket for his phone after muttering “shut up”.

“Ezra hasn’t texted me in like a million years, so I’ve been feeling like shit,” Harry whines, his voice coming up a pitch. “This is like, the _one_ guy in a while who I actually think could be my boyfriend and then, _poof_ , he goes ghost.”

Louis offers nothing but a blink, not even bearing the energy to tell the boy the same encouraging shit he tells him all the time. He’s pretty much a broken tape recorder at this point.

“Just completely fucking off, is exactly what he’s doing. Like at some point I have to ask _is_ it me? Like, genuinely, is it me? Because I feel like it’s definitely me. How else am I supposed to feel when I get ghosted after just being myself. God, I will never have a fucking boyfriend, will I?”

“It’s only been a few days,” Louis replies with exhaustion, rolling his head back over to face the boy. “I’m sure he’ll text you. Jesus.”

“And why are you positive he will?” Harry asks, eyes growing big with desperation as they meet Louis’ lenses. “Why are you so sure he likes me enough?”

“Because…” Louis begins, shrugging as he puckers his lips forward. “I mean, you’re not ugly.”

Harry’s big animation eyes are dimmed out as he instead chooses to roll them, pocketing his phone hastily. “Thanks.”

Louis hums with ease whilst Harry moves to slide his backpack back upon himself, shoulder by shoulder and most likely feeling much better than he’d initially felt when he’d approached Louis just half an hour ago, having a near meltdown.

“I’ll let you get back to your much less dramatic day,” Harry says as he works to shrug his backpack on comfortably. “I just had to…get that almost-heart attack out of the way. I couldn’t even let it linger for one second after Niall’d told me.”

“C’mon Haz.” Louis sits up a bit, looking pointedly at Harry and cocking his head. “You know I wouldn’t fuck up like that right before graduation.”

“That’s why I was so shocked, especially since you didn’t tell the rumor to me before I’d heard about it,” Harry answers, voice a tad hushed as he settles back into the seat again. “I guess…um.” He scratches his chin with his index finger for a moment, his eyes fluttering to different places and his mind obviously moving. “I guess not getting proper time with you in days has me growing a bit unfamiliar with you,” he says, adding a brief laugh without really meeting Louis’ eye.

Louis just barely smirks, giving Harry a few specks of credit for that somewhat funny statement in regards to the fact that they haven’t seen each other much in recent time. He gets a few points for it.

“I’ll text you” is the last thing Harry’s saying as he moves to push the door open to leave—well, that is until he’s out of the car, just about to close the door behind himself, and offers the boy a “love you”.

“Yeah, yeah, just close the door,” is how Louis replies, already positioning his key in the ignition as he sits up. He hears Harry chuckle amusedly before the door is shut behind him, and he can’t help but feel immensely refreshed from that brief, peculiar car session they’d just had. One of many, but definitely the weirdest one yet.

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

Louis sways back and forth on the leg he has propped up on top of one of the stairs out in front of the school, the feeling of being the only one on the premises but not inside the building right now making him feel sort of risky and vulnerable.

He has his phone pressed up against his ear, and he has a giant backpack currently sitting in the heat of his car down in the parking lot below, (he’d dug it up from his dad’s black hole of a closet—hopefully he never realizes it’s missing), and it’s filled with everything, including changes of clothing, changes of shoes, canned fruits and soups that are somewhat appetizing, giant water canteens, a compass (that Louis doesn’t know how to use), and pepper spray just in case, along with a giant, rolled up sleeping bag strapped next to it. As one can tell he’s quite prepared for the events of today.

Louis wasn’t even supposed to step a foot in the school today, nor was Harry, but they’d found themselves in a bit of a predicament once school officials were surveying the senior parking lot to make sure no one was skipping class—and of course Harry was already inside, having to fetch one of his first-aid kits from their locker (don't ask Louis why it's even in there), bringing Louis to eventually have to make his way to his first class as well. He’d snuck out of the building right before third period though, which is why he’s stood out here under the boiling sun, hiking boots weighed down on his feet and a massive fanny pack of extra essentials around his hip.

What makes everything all the more frustrating is that he’s still on the phone with Harry, trying to walk the boy through how he should maneuver in order to exit the school without getting caught.

The problem right now is, he has to sneak out, which is difficult considering the school seems to be cracking down on exact occurrences like these lately, counselors and janitors and assistant teachers now tending to loiter around the hallways during classes in order to catch students in the act.

“Hurry up, will you?” Louis asks, frustration hard on his face as he swats a fly away. “I told you, the secret hallway by the library is usually always clear. Just take that shortcut towards the main hallway.”

Harry’s voice comes about on the other end, frantic and full of static as he speaks. “What you don’t understand is I’m not you, Louis.” Louis rolls his eyes and groans, foot still remaining propped up on a stone step and all his weight being leaned into it. “I’m not as likely to just miraculously get away with this like you are. I have _bad luck_.”

“Will you shut up?” Louis replies, one of his hands coming up to slide his sunglasses down over his face. “The bell’s supposed to ring in like two minutes, and if you wait that long, you’ll have absolutely _no_ luck getting out of there scot free. You’d better be talking to me from the secret library hallway right now—“

“Louis?”

The sound of his name brings Louis’ gaze to shoot towards it, finding the figure of Zayn, donned in his usual laidback attire of a muscle tee and joggers, striding up towards the school with his book bag hanging off of one shoulder. His initial look of curious confusion is gradually turned into something more subtly amused, the sun shining in his eyes as he approaches the boy.

“What are you doing out here?”

“I’m skipping,” Louis replies easily, just as the sharp, slightly faraway sound of one of the double doors being pushed open cuts into their moment. Louis doesn’t stir, however, knowing the only person who could possibly be coming out of those doors right now is Harry, meaning they should be good to go right about now. “What are _you_ doing here?”

“I’m late,” Zayn replies dejectedly, just as Harry’s walking up and immediately sliding himself into whatever they’re talking about as he looks at his wristwatch.

“Dude, it’s almost fourth period,” Harry chimes in, one of the flashlights dropping out of the side pocket of his bag and forcing him to have to reach down to retrieve it, even though it becomes quite the chase as it rolls away and Louis blinks indifferently.

“I know,” Zayn replies, taking a moment to chuckle at himself. “Why do you guys have those weird bags?”

Louis suppresses a vexed huff behind his lips, because Zayn and his oh so wondrous and dimwitted nature is usually something quite entertaining, but right now, they’re on a strict time schedule based on the many things he and Harry plan to do today, and also, on the verge of getting caught if that bell rings to signify switching between classes and someone decides to pop their head out here.

“Oh, we’re uh,” Harry begins, finally having scooped the flashlight up as he heaves and rejoins them. “We’re going on like, a best friends outdoor trip sort of thing.”

Louis crosses his arms as he gets both feet down from the steps, snorting only once in dismay. “God, do you have to make it sound so disgusting?”

“What else do you want me to say?”

“We’re just _doing_ stuff,” Louis replies, eyes not really focused on either of the boys in front of him as his glasses remain heavy over his eyes. “Like…stuff we haven’t.”

The “ _ohhh_ ” that Zayn lets out to communicate that he understands it better now is almost insufferably long and fading in tone, but when he’s finally telling them to have fun with that and making his way up the steps, Louis' more than pumped for the both of them to finally venture to his car while the coast is clear, and he's immensely grateful that they were only intercepted by one of the few people at school who wouldn’t snitch on them for ditching. Even Liam would’ve possibly snitched if he'd stumbled on them, just out of the pure fact that Louis’ doing it with Harry.

With both of their giant multi-pocketed industrial bags containing the essentials they’d felt necessary for the events of today, school bags to hold everything extra, rolled up sleeping bags side by side and almost blocking Louis’ view of the rear window, the backseats of Louis’ car are filled directly behind them once they’ve started out of the parking lot. Harry’s looking comfortable as ever as he rests his feet up on the dashboard throughout most of the ride and has his head hanging out of the car window, whipping his exceptionally bewitching hair in every possible way.

They also find themselves listening to some randomized playlist from that weird app on Harry’s phone that he uses to stream music, which explains why they’re both now passionately belting to Lady Gaga’s “You and I” as though it’s their favorite song in the world.

Harry makes a point to sit up just a bit, head fully inside of the car now (albeit hair still cascading around him) as he passionately plays an imaginary guitar during the designated break, head banging with passion and Louis struggling between watching him with amusement and keeping his eyes on the highway.

“I’m gonna be _screaming_ that part as we’re jumping off, I swear,” Harry proclaims, laughing breathlessly after he’s just finished joining Lady Gaga in belting lyrics about buying a house in heaven, Louis still in a state of watchful entertainment.

“I’ll hold you to it,” Louis replies, actually very much prepared for how that will go.

“No, I’m serious.”

Louis settles back into his seat just a bit more, one hand bracing the bottom of the wheel as he grins. “As if you’ll even remember how to speak once you’re plunging through the sky at thousands of kilometers per hour, nothing but deep, hard ocean coming right at you.”

This seems to get Harry to simmer just a little, it being clear in the way he doesn’t immediately laugh or quip back at Louis like Louis expects him to. Instead he just itches at the crook of his neck, appearing to get lost in thought as he watches the road ahead of them.

“We’re going to the one in Mordova, right?” he asks, sounding as though he had to muster up the strength in his voice.

Louis shakes his head in response, even though he’s aware they’d agreed on Mordova and he’d gone and changed the cliff they’re jumping off of without telling the boy. Pretty much basic cause for problems and arguments.

“What?” Harry asks, sitting up that much more and bringing his feet down.

“We’re going to the one in Santana,” Louis pretty much mumbles, although the sly smirk upon his mouth gives away the devious nature of his answer.

“What the fuck. We didn’t agree on that, Louis,” Harry replies, clearly taking this to heart as he continues to sit up out of his seat and face Louis wholeheartedly. “We _can’t_ go to that one!”

“Why _not?”_ Louis asks, whipping his head towards Harry briefly. “It’s higher, and it’s funner, and…it’s riskier—“

“My point exactly!” Harry yells, the now background noise of dubstep music becoming more hilarious than anything. “Louis. At least one person has _died_ jumping off of that thing and into the water.”

“Yeah, and _hundreds_ jump off every year,” Louis replies exhaustedly. “God, stop being a wuss. I really don’t want most of today to consist of you whining and worrying.”

In Louis’ peripheral it seems like Harry’s mouth is opening, the boy clearly not quite on board with continuing to argue, or maybe being void of words, or probably wanting to just smack Louis upside the head more likely. Louis takes the time to speak again, however, this time choosing to be much gentler in delivery.

“It’ll be fine, Harry,” Louis speaks up, eyes straight ahead and body void of tension. “I won’t let anything happen to you.”

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

They honestly should’ve included hiking in their list of activities today, because it quickly turns out that the journey uphill and through the forest towards the cliff they intend to jump off of is exactly that—a hiking trip.

They’re not even halfway there and the heat already has Louis' t-shirt sticking to his body like a magnet, Harry and his lack of excercising abilities and low endurance bringing them both to have to continuously take breaks where they just stop, stand around, and wait for the boy to catch his breath. Jesus, imagine him at thirty if he’s already like this now.

“Can’t believe…” Harry begins, Louis hearing the boy panting in between words as he remains ahead of him and treks up a rocky path in between trees. At least the tall bark and leafy branches are blocking a lot of the sun’s rays. “…I’m putting in all this energy…” Harry continues, breathing relentlessly again before proceeding. “…to go jump off of a death trap.”

Louis doesn’t even know the point at which they start, but they definitely start mumbling and humming some parts of “You and I” under their breaths as they journey. It most certainly helps a bit to keep morale up.

They’d left their giant bags in the car for the next part of their day and are currently only embarking on this journey with the water canteens they have strapped to their hips and the clothes on their backs, and Louis is very happy about that decision at this moment in time. They’d even left their phones behind, Louis having convinced Harry that it wouldn’t hurt them to part with those soul sucking devices for just a little bit, and you know, actually be in the moment with the constant mosquitoes, deep grass that suddenly turns into mud, and uphill climbing. It’d seemed like a good idea at the time.

So they’re thirty miles far from home and they’re nearing the top of a cliff with absolutely no phones on them. It’s exhilarating.

When the rocky, igneous silver surface of the cliff comes into view, it’s almost like heaven. Louis legitimately believes that if heaven is legit, this must be exactly what it feels like to get into it, because he currently feels a gratefully euphoric sensation after having worked so hard for this mere view. Even the way the sun is gracing the cliff displays something ethereal, Louis not even realizing Harry has stopped in his tracks next to him as well as they both just gawk forth at it.

Louis turns his eyes toward Harry, although the boy is fully entranced as his eyes remain forth, his lips speechlessly parted. Louis doesn’t think the boy is seeing this cliff in the same way as him though—he probably sees it as intimidating and menacing rather than beautiful and sculpted for this exact moment.

Louis reaches out to set his fingers under the boy’s chin and close his mouth, finally bringing the boy back down to earth.

“Flies will nest,” Louis tells him, before walking forth in order to fulfill exactly what they came here to do.

Of course, Harry follows behind him as he often does like a puppy lost in the city, Louis wasting no time in setting his canteen down and preparing to strip down to the swim trunks he’s wearing underneath this outfit.

Even though it’s blaringly obvious, Louis doesn’t acknowledge the fact that Harry definitely takes a moment or two to stand there wordlessly and quite observantly as Louis’ pulling his own shirt off and over his head. The boy is gay, for god’s sake, and Louis is a male athlete. Louis would be offended if he _didn’t_ take a little time to collect himself.

But soon they’re both very much stripping down to their swim trunks, Louis taking notice of the funny looking yellow ones the boy’s always insisted on wearing whenever a pool event called for it. Louis lets his amusement show in the form of a single pleased hum, only making teasy eyes at Harry for a moment as he keeps his hands on his hips where his simple black trunks are sitting comfortably.

He takes some steps upon the rocky platform they’re on, the bottoms of his bare feet feeling the immediate heat with every step he takes upon the surface, Louis figuring this may be a glimpse into what the rocks at the bottom of the ocean may feel like…well, if he ends up hitting them.

He brings himself as safe a distance to the edge of the cliff as he can, not prepared to jump right now, but attempting to get a peek of what they’re dealing with, exactly.

And what he finds is…not so chill.

The idea of this was definitely glorified.

“You know, my mom always said,” Harry begins, Louis hearing the boy still relatively far behind him, probably folding their clothes neatly in order to put them off to the side. “If Louis jumped off a cliff, would you do the same?”

Louis sucks his teeth dismissively, although still keeping his eyes glued to the swaying, blue and white hues of the devastatingly large body of water down below, the view of it from here almost making him dizzy. More so than the top of the hotel skyscraper, by tons. 

“She didn’t say that. Anne loves me.”

“No—remember? When we both decided to try edibles for the first time?” Harry asks, followed by the sound of him coming closer by his voice, although his footsteps are silent.

Louis strokes a palm behind his neck, still not able to tear his eyes away from the water, but indulging in Harry’s words. He certainly remembers the edible incident. They’d gotten sent to the school nurse for acting so crazy. “Oh. That makes sense.”

It seems like maybe Harry’s getting ready to say something else, but even Louis could’ve predicted that it would get caught in his throat once he joined the boy side by side in looking down below. The boy couldn’t even look down when they had the best seats at the top of the city, much less look at this.

“Woah,” Harry says, voice sounding close by Louis’ ear, followed by a steady gulp.

Louis doesn’t say anything in response, either because he doesn’t know what to say, or because he doesn’t want to open his mouth and reveal himself to be uncertain about whether this is still something they should do. He can’t let Harry know he’s even a little shaken, because then they’ll just be headed right back down this hill in the blink of an eye and that whole hike would’ve been for _nothing_.

“You think it’s deep enough?” come Harry’s words, almost whispered.

Louis continues to look forth, now starting to shake out his hands by his sides as he contemplates that question only briefly.

He begins backing up on his feet, taking several lunges backwards as he swallows the trepidation in his throat and shakes his hands out even more wildly now.

“We’re gonna have to hope so,” Louis replies, before propelling himself forward with the racing of his feather light feet, practically gusting past Harry like a sharp wind, and just _going_ for it.

He makes the jump count, launching himself in the air as much as he can, using the technique he has stored from when he used to be able to do back flips. Everything happening, every motion he takes, running forth, leaping up into the air, bringing himself into a ball—it all happens in a place that’s sort of completely out of his body. He didn’t even hear Harry scream with concern in response to his lack of announcement. He can’t even tell if he’s screaming himself.

He honestly might’ve died in the air due to the adrenaline, and the whiplash of gravity coming into play, and the stomach-dropping madness of it all. He’s not sure.

That is, until he hits water. And he _definitely_ feels it.

It’s not a violent enough crash to break any bones, but it’s definitely hard enough to temporarily mute all of Louis’ senses as he goes under. The change from air to water is way too abrupt for Louis to even remember that he’s supposed to be holding his breath, which results in a lot of breath hiccuping, and submerged confusion, and near lightheadedness as he’s down under, forcing his eyelids open and still not being able to concentrate, due to the fact that he’s _also_ having a near panic attack underwater.

Like, he might actually drown right now. This is crazy.

Louis catches himself as much as he can, bearing no idea of how deep underwater he is as his arms flail around him and his legs sway with as much grace as possible, and he tries to collect his breath to a still, not having enough inside of his lungs but knowing he needs to hold off on inhaling for as long as possible. Which is difficult, considering a lot of water has filled his nose, and his mouth, and probably his airways by now, and as he swims himself aimlessly, hoping to get somewhere close to the surface, the desperation to breathe becomes overwhelmingly dire.

The sensation of hands gripping him up under his arms is hardly discernible from the heavy, aggressive pull of the water around him, but when he finds himself being brought upwards and closer to a surface of light, Louis figures being lifted out of the water is exactly what’s happening right now.

He’s sputtering water out of his mouth and hacking a great deal once his head is above water again, and the words that Harry’s hurriedly throwing at him about his well-being take a backseat to the fact that Louis is trying to regulate his lungs again.

“Fuck,” Louis coughs, beating at his chest a few more times as it seems he’s almost well again, Harry still gripping him on both sides of his arms and staring at him with hard brows and fierce eyes. His wet hair is completely slicked back and significantly long in this state, water dripping down his face in glimmers.

Once Louis’ settled down for a moment, water still itching inside of his nose and his ears still mostly blocked due to being under for quite a bit, Louis makes a sudden revelation.

“I think I lost my trunks,” Louis states, already feeling somewhat amused about it as Harry’s face seems to soften, the boy clearly more thankful than anything that Louis is okay and able to be jocular so quickly again.

“First one to find them gets to touch your _dick!”_ Harry shouts obnoxiously, already floating backwards and blindly swaying his hands through the water as he chuckles happily.

“Over my _dead body_!” Louis yells right back, figuring they’re both now just screaming because they can and no one’s here for what seems like miles.

Harry’s response is a little less booming, but still loud enough to hear as the boy brushes both hands back and through his hair and watches Louis genuinely move his hand around for his bottoms under water. “Well, that was literally almost the case, so…”

Louis makes his journey all the way over to Harry just so he can garner up as much momentum as he can to splash the boy, and as they continue to joke and squeal and (thankfully) find Louis’ trunks, Louis can’t even stress over how close he was to drowning, just about fifteen minutes ago.

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

“Yeah—I told you, I’m fine,” Harry says, phone pressed against his ear as he walks alongside Louis. 

The boy’s mother had clearly had a hard time with the fact that he'd parted with his phone for a while (when they were risking their lives with the cliff diving and stuff), and she’d been calling just to check on him (even though he was supposed to be in school at the time, so why exactly is she so paranoid anyway, jeez) which is why he’s constantly having to reassure the lady that he’s fine and that he and Louis are about to hang out “after school” (the school day has been done for over two hours—surprisingly, hiking up to the cliff, diving off of it, and fucking around in the water took up a great amount of time).

Now, they’re supposed to be camping. They’d originally planned to be authentic and set up camp deep in the woods, preferably right by the cliff they’d jumped off of since it’d seemed fitting, but Harry’d accidentally told his mother that they’d planned to camp together and spoiled their plans through and through.

Now they’ve already trekked _back_ uphill after the cliff dive to retrieve their belongings (there should really be a handbook on this, or something), trekked downhill again, gotten back into Louis’ car, and found their way back towards the city where Harry’s mother will be safe knowing they’re not going too far out, and they’re literally walking along the neatly made trail in one of the community parks.

They’re going to camp at the _park_ so Harry’s mom won’t freak out.

At least it’s something.

All Louis can be thankful for is the fact that Harry’s slippery lips didn’t fuck up and let Anne know that they’d also planned to _cliff dive_ today. Louis’ certain her head would’ve popped right off of her shoulders.

“Yeah, like I told you. Just camping,” Harry continues, Louis hearing the muffled sounds of her concerned words on the other end. “Mom…there are no wild animals at the park.”

Louis suppresses the groan he wants to let out, which is something he regularly has to do when bearing witness to Harry’s tedious check-in phone conversations such as these. To this day he’s not sure if it’s irksome to him because of the overbearing hindrance of it all, or if it’s because it better showcases the fact that Louis has absolutely no one like that in his life. Someone who gives a shit enough to badger him constantly about the things he’s doing and where he’s doing it and who he’s doing it with.

Maybe he’s got the better end of the stick though. He’s free to do whatever.

“I dunno,” Harry says, sounding only a tad impatient. “Just _because_. We just feel like it.”

Louis wipes the beginnings of sweat away from his forehead as they walk, now having every reason to be fatigued now, especially since they’re currently lugging the bags that they’d packed on their backs and hanging off of their shoulders. The sky is more of a purple-ish black, the late evening growing near as only a few people can be observed power walking down the trails in the park, feeding ducks, helping their little kid ride a bike, all the usual happenings. No one even seems to look at them crazy for carrying all this stuff.

Louis nudges Harry in the ribs once he sees an area of the park, just a little dense with trees in the distance if they keep walking ahead, and he makes a point to gesture his head towards it once Harry gives the boy his attention.

It’s not earnest, raw _wilderness_ material, but with the circumstances they’re given, it’ll do.

They eventually are immersing themselves in the quiet calm of the nicely spaced out elm trees, both of them dumping everything off of their backs and shoulders as a sort of silent serenity cloud seems to come over the pair, probably due to a combination of the euphoric cliff diving shenanigans earlier, the fact that the dark purple hue of everything is currently mystifying, and the fact that they’ve finally made it to their camping site.

“Okay, I’m not exactly sure—“ Harry begins, working to undo one of the strapped up bags full of the necessities he'd apparently brought along for the tent. “Like, sure how this works, but.”

“It doesn’t just blow up?” Louis asks, crossing his arms and resting his back against the nearest tree.

“No,” Harry pauses, now kneeled down on the ground as he attempts to spread out the manual in front of him. “I don’t think any tent of value does that.”

“Then what the hell is this?” Louis asks, kicking himself up from being leaned against the tree and walking over, picking up this large, silver cylinder type thing that’s been strapped to Harry’s bag the entire day, Louis entirely convinced the tent had been contained in it.

Harry’s eyes are slow coming up from the manual he still has held in front of him, inspecting what it is Louis’ inquiring about. “It’s a thermos. It has thick soup in it,” he replies, monotonous and almost patronizing. “You didn’t seriously think the tent was in that, did you?”

Louis rolls his eyes before tossing the thing at Harry, as always just assuming he’ll catch it in time, which he does, right after dropping the manual and opening his hands as rapidly as he can. “You can feed an entire country with that thing. Just open it because I’m starving.”

Despite their usual spew of back and forth antics, the peace and quietude of this moment between the trees, everything growing increasingly darker around them, and crickets making their peculiar noises in the distance, still keeps everything calm, Louis breathing gently in and out as he crosses his arms and watches Harry from where he stands above him.

It’s hard for Louis to fight the way his lips quiver, Harry not even having to look but pretty much just sensing it, since he’s clearly struggling to get the gigantic thermos open as he twists at it fully with his arm, shakes at it, and looks very…suggestive in all of his movements.

Harry pauses, hands cupped around the cylinder of the thing and eyes bored as he looks at Louis. “You have the humor of a prepubescent child.” He tosses it off to the side, preparing to push himself up from his knees as Louis knits his eyebrows dejectedly. “I’m setting up the tent.”

As peacefully scenic as everything is right now, there’s this extra…something in the air. Louis doesn’t know if Harry feels it too, but it’s definitely there. Maybe because at this point it’s clear there isn’t anyone else in the park (except creeps, probably), and it’s intimately dark in this strange way as they don’t say much to each other, and simply try to navigate how to fix up the tent by burying the stakes into the ground exactly where they go and just…moving around each other. It’s a strange aura. Not a bad strange, though.

Or maybe they’ve just spent so much time together today that Louis is starting to feel delirious.

“Okay,” Harry blurts at some moment, certainly being the first person to have actually said something in fifteen minutes. He works at sticking one rod into another vehemently as he speaks, grunting and struggling to get them to fit, all while definitely not meeting eyes with Louis, who is working to secure one edge of the tent down. “Elephant in the room.”

“In the park, actually,” Louis interrupts, seizing the miniscule pause in Harry’s sentence.

Harry only hums and smirks slightly as he barely offers Louis a glance, and as iffy and shifting as the energy is becoming right now, Louis is still relaxed and cool. 

“We kissed,” Harry continues, still securing the rods and concentrating his eyes on the task fiercely.

“Jeez,” Louis replies, only swallowing faintly as he looks around with fake worry. “Lower your voice, will you? Don’t need everyone knowing how low my standards drop when I’m drunk.”

This is what actually gets Harry to let loose a bit and laugh, finally having secured the rods together and holding it limp at his side. “Ha ha. Very funny.”

All Louis does is glisten his eyes at the boy right back, not even knowing if his microscopic grin is able to be seen within the dim shadows of all the trees.

“But I just wanted to, like,” Harry begins, lunging down in order to stick the rod into the ground where it goes. “Acknowledge that we both know it happened. That we aren’t being weirdos about it.”

Louis doesn’t know why, but now that it’s been said, it’s almost like he’s been…waiting for Harry to say it. Like his body has been impatient wondering if the boy will ever address it, and the feeling that he’s getting right now isn’t torn or panicked or stuck. It’s like he’s been set free of something invisible. All he’s really wanted was to be assured he and his best friend were on normal terms, and he feels like addressing it right now, the cool, natural way they are, has confirmed that.

“Pretty sure it comes with doing _everything_ ,” Louis teases, Harry giggling in response. “Now come over here and help me secure this edge down, since you couldn’t just get a blow up tent like a regular person.”

And just like that, they’re back in tune. It means a lot to Louis, the fact that something like this would wither away and tear apart at a lot of dynamics just out of sheer unnecessary drama, and unspoken feelings, and dramatic fluff, but he and Harry can just snap right back to it. It must be a testament to what friendships are actually strong enough to withstand certain things.

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

“Well,” Harrry mumbles, legs crossed underneath himself and hands braced up under his chin.

“Well,” Louis repeats, settled back into many of the plump messes of pillows and watching the shadows against the walls of this small tent change with the wavering light of the candle they have lit in the middle of it.

They were supposed to make s’mores. Making s’mores was definitely on the list of things to do on this “camping trip”, but now that they’ve _finally_ got the tent set up, have endured a day of hiking and drowning, the last thing they want to do is somehow conjure up a fire outside with absolutely no experience and twist around marshmallows on a stick. 

Harry begins laughing, his shoulders shaking with it as his toes wriggle underneath the socks he has on. It doesn’t take long for Louis to lazily teeter along with him, still watching the shadows upon the tent and fully understanding what’s funny about all of this.

“This was so stupid,” Harry chuckles, words buried into his hands. His hair is probably the most chaotic Louis’ ever seen it, the scarf he wears not doing much to tame it after he’d launched himself into an ocean. He looks like something out of a survival reality show.

“Extremely,” Louis replies, his entertainment gaining momentum as they both continue to stack amusement on top of one another. “I can literally hear traffic nearby.”

“Like, are we supposed to hunt down squirrels now, or something?” Harry asks, his words hardly heard due to the way he laughs it out, even having to wipe the tears away from one of his eyes for a moment.

“I really just want a pizza,” Louis says, still chortling right along with the boy. “We should’ve spaced these activities out.”

“Definitely.”

That’s the one thing they do seem to enthusiastically agree on— ordering pizza. Harry makes use of his phone in order to get it delivered to the park and the both of them ultimately decide that there’s still gratification in the fact that they’ve set up this tent and are going to use it in order to sleep outside. That’s not something everyone gets to accomplish in their lifetimes.

It basically just becomes another night of blankets and sheet forts and endless talking and snowballed reminiscing, the both of them stuffing their faces with Hawaiian pizza and sharing one of the canteens of ice cold lemonade that Harry’d brought along with him, all while Harry’s battery-powered radio is playing low quality throwback jams in the background on low volume. The boy had really thought things through when he’d packed for this thing, Louis has now realized.

Louis’ just so content that they’ve found themselves back in sync, especially when it’d begun to seem as though things were growing just a bit… off.

But now they’re talking about stupid shit that absolutely no one else in the universe would be able to understand if they’d listened in, completely sober and able to form the stupidest, yet most entertaining conversations about things as idiotic as how the word “Hawaiian” sounds weird and alien when it’s repeated too many times.

The conversation evolves quite seamlessly, the both of them going from their meaningless commentary on the sounds of words, to memorable moments in Harry’s brief run as a member of the drama club (Louis genuinely thinks Harry’s talented in theater and decides to let him know it), to simply talking about life and all of its stupid twists and turns that no one really asks for or wants.

“Really crazy…” Harry begins, voice softly low and eyes dazed, a nearly empty pizza box shoved toward a far corner of the tent. “How you never really feel like this point will ever _come_...like graduating, and growing up and stuff. Until it's just already fuckin' happening.”

Louis doesn’t even have to ask for any elaboration to find himself inwardly identifying with that feeling, sprawled out on his back with his knees swayed to one side and his eyes "star gazing" at the roof of the tent, where it comes together to a point. He's almost sleepy in a weird sense.

"Absolute madness," he decides to respond, half sure he hadn't even said it loud enough for Harry to hear where the boy's sat upright and somewhat close to him. "...this life shit," Louis eventually decides to continue, his brows furrowing a bit.

"And this life shit just continues to happen and never fucking stops? That's batshit _insane,"_ Harry adds on, his voice almost hilariously passionate.

This brings Louis to peek at the boy out of the corner of his eye, a sort of hidden joke behind his closed lips that they both seem to pick up on quite quickly, finding the strangely introspective and hushed nature of this conversation very amusing.

Harry's breaths are coming out through laughter now, his eyes sparkling at Louis and his fingers splaying his lips.

Then his attention and mind are seeming to be just barely shifted, Louis receiving this sort of quietly more thoughtful look from the boy, as all he does himself is shake his head at the boy one last time and position his gaze back upward.

“Louis Tomlinson, a promiscuous virgin,” Harry says, letting out a breath of what seems like ease as he brings the lemonade canteen to his lips and stares off into the distance thoughtfully. “Who would’ve thought.”

Louis groans as he sits himself up, his palms braced behind himself and directly on top of the dirt of the grass. He honestly feels like they were supposed to bring some type of rug or functioning “floor” for the tent, or something.

“Ugh, this again,” Louis says, resting his eyes momentarily.

“I’m still completely baffled by that, genuinely,” Harry pipes up, twisting the top back on the canteen. “Like, I still haven’t wrapped my head around it…probably because of how…ready you always seem.”

Louis doesn’t hesitate to show the judgment on his face, still sat back with his weight leaned on his hands but cocking his head at Harry nonetheless. “What’s _that_ supposed to mean?”

Harry seems just a bit caught off guard as he takes in Louis’ offense, his eyes going wide and his shoulders moving up and down as he tries to get the words out. “Like…you’re a busy guy. Don’t act like that’s new information,” Harry replies defensively. “It’s like you can’t even survive without someone on your hip.”

“Not true.”

“Okay, well, we all know you’re Mr. Solitude, of course,” Harry says, quickly correcting himself. “But you’re obsessed with having someone handy—particularly someone handy that you can canoodle with whenever you feel like, and such.”

Louis ponders his words for a little bit, his chin rested in his chest and his fingertips stroking against the grass. He’d never really thought of it that way. It almost sounds kind of wrong, hearing Harry say it like this.

“So it’s just crazy that you haven’t done it,” Harry says quietly, fingers toying with the canteen before setting it to the side. “Especially with how flirty you get when you’re drunk.”

Louis’ mouth is dropping open again, the boy making a point to shove at Harry’s arm with a mixture of roughness and clumsiness. “I am _not_.”

“Oh, this isn’t even a debate,” Harry says, entirely too sure of himself as he struggles to contain a laugh. He even continues to reaffirm his words as Louis’ pressuring him to take it back. “So _incredibly_ flirty. With everyone. It’d actually thrown me off so much the first time we got drunk together on new year’s. _Harry, do you always smell so good?”_ the boy continues, raising his voice an octave similar to that of a girl’s, which doesn’t make any sense. All of his impressions sound the same. “ _Let me play with your hair, and sit in your lap_. Safe to say at first I was very annoyed and frustrated as the gay, teenage boy that I am. But I’m used to it by now.”

Louis rolls his head to the side, resting it upon his shoulder as he remains comfortably seated. “I can’t be _that_ bad anymore.”

“Louis, you kissed me.”

“Okay, well. I wouldn’t say that was _completely_ because I was drunk,” Louis replies defensively, his shoulders coming up a bit. “Pretty sure it would’ve happened whether we drank or not. That’s just…what happened in the moment.”

Harry is observed taking in a breath, a slow, practiced one as he looks forth with no focus, and then he speaks, rather lowly and gently. “Okay, I,” Harry says. “Um…I don’t. I don’t really know how to respond—“

“What?” Louis finishes for him, voice even lower than Harry’s as his heavy, sleepy eyes remain trained on the side of the boy’s face, watching him look at nothing. “Just say you liked it, it’s not that hard.”

“Pretty sure I’d like anything with how long it’s been since I’ve been kissed,” Harry replies, now pulling on the plaid fabric at his pants and implicitly conveying that they’ve crossed a threshold where Harry is now _nervous_ and slightly on edge. “Thank you for being modest though.”

“So like…” Louis begins, shifting his hips a bit and letting his mind and the things that are on it take control of this conversation right now. “How long has it been since you’ve done, like, other things then?” He doesn’t move his eyes from Harry for even half a second as he gets the question out, genuinely curious in the purest way possible and taking notice of the way Harry’s Adam’s apple bobs. “Besides sex, obviously. The last thing I remember is you making out with that French exchange student. But that can't be the _last_ time, can it?” Louis' more contemplating to himself now as he thinks on it, figuring that'd be a pretty long while ago if it _is_ the case.

Harry’s eyes seem to be almost glazed over as it’s apparent he’s dead set on not meeting eyes with Louis, now violently twisting around the material of his pants with his fingers. “Why are we talking about this?”

“Because we’re friends. I thought we could share this kind of stuff.”

“Well now it’s weird.”

“It’s only weird because you make it weird,” Louis replies easily, figuring the solution is pretty obvious. “Weirdo.”

There’s a silence that follows, save for the increased static of the hushed radio as it seems to be in need of a rearranged antenna, Louis pressing his lips together and not understanding what the boy’s deal is exactly. They aren’t always _explicit_ about what exactly they do in the bedroom—which is clear in the way Harry didn’t even know Louis was a “virgin”—but fleetingly mentioning that they'd had a recent hookup or made out with someone was never really hard for them to do with each other.

“Jeremy,” Harry answers simply, deep in thought.

Louis’ head picks up in response to this, his mouth open long before he actually even says anything. “Swim team Jeremy?”

“Yep,” Harry replies, pursing his lips. “End of last year.”

Louis closes his mouth slowly, taking some time to think on that as he sluggishly nods his head at himself. This is genuinely the first time he's ever heard this.

“I sucked him off in the locker room, long after practice one day. Nothing too wild,” Harry continues, now seeming as though he’s having a monologue with himself more than anything. “But that’s why it kind of annoyed me. When the swim team kept being assholes at my plays. Him too.”

Louis doesn’t say anything, just continues to sit there in silent understanding, figuring that it definitely helps, being a lot more open about these parts of themselves with each other. It gives some insight that Louis otherwise wouldn’t have guessed in the slightest.

“It’s not even…” Harry begins, shifting a bit and crossing his legs under himself again, Louis quietly admiring the child-like sight of it. “I’m mature enough where I’m not emotionally pained by things like that, but it just kinda sucks. It’s like, why I’m not so quick to just… _give_ myself to someone like that, because for me, it’s either shitty hot guys like him, or super old, handsome creeps. It’s like…I can’t trust anyone enough, you know.”

Louis hums in understanding, eyes low and now merely watchful of the way Harry subtly tears at the edges of his fingernails.

“Just for my first time. I want it to be someone I can trust—I won’t give a shit after that, because I’ll be used to it and know what to expect, but,” Harry continues, knitting his brows and speaking with a hush. “I just want to remember my first time well. Like, not with some douche from high school who will kick me in the face later on.” When the end of Harry’s monologue fades into a bit of a sad chuckle, Louis joins in with him by letting only a small one-sided grin creep onto his lips, fully reveling in the ataraxia of human sharing and connection. Like, it shouldn’t even be such a big deal that both of them have never had penetrative sex before. It’s merely just a _form_ of sex, for crying out loud. The word “virgin” shouldn’t even exist, since it’s nothing more than a made-up concept.

“I’m not holding out, if you’re wondering why I’m still here,” Louis replies, sighing for a moment. “I just…haven’t, and I’m not into pushing girls to do anything. I just don’t care, really. It’s not the only way to have sex.”

“Totally,” Harry replies, sounding a bit stupefied as a crooked grin pulls at his lips. His next few words are a bit mumbled after a period of silence, as though he’s a bit shy in terms of saying it. “I do wanna do it though.”

“Of course you do. You’re a natural born bottom.”

“I should’ve never taught you gay terms.”

“It’s like, in your blood,” Louis continues thoughtfully. “Wanting to do it.”

“The way this conversation is going, it feels like we’re about to do it,” Harry points out, chewing on his lip for a moment as Louis bites back a grin at how on point that feels. “Like this is the beginning of a porno, or something.”

Louis makes a point of dramatically gasping. “We even got pizza delivered too. Is it too late to catch the delivery guy and ask him to join?”

“Shut up,” Harry guffaws, fully folding over in order to bury his giggles into his lap, Louis watching him with an adulated air.

There’s a comfortable quietness that ensues, Louis once again acknowledging how easily they can just talk about stuff that would absolutely be crossing the line with any other pair, Harry seeming to have gotten out of the flustered funk he was about to slip into just minutes ago.

Louis’ mind is still moving, however. Coming up with those super short-term goals he’s always so keen on conjuring, and starting to feel a _want_ to do things, right now, in this moment. Things that make sense in this moment.

Especially with Harry looking so nice. Pretty much this entire day.

“Well…I mean,” Louis begins, taking one of his hands out of the dirt to scratch at the crook of his neck for a moment where he sits up more properly. Then he's dropping both of his hands down into his lap, where his legs are loosely crossed. “It would just kind of make sense, really.”

The lack of sound emerging from next to him causes Louis to bring his eyes toward the boy, finding him just a bit wider in the eyes as his mouth appears to be trying to say something, although failing at it greatly.

“Yeah?” Louis continues, as though agreeing with himself since the boy isn’t saying anything. “Like you said...wouldn’t you want your first time to be with someone that you know cared? Don’t quote me on this but I’m pretty sure your first time is supposed to be a lot…erm, rougher than mine.”

It’s as though Harry is listening, but his response switch is on a bit of a delay as Louis just blinks at him patiently and maybe with a bit of an annoyed edge. Harry perks up just a bit as he does one of those forced laugh things he always does, which immediately brings Louis to try to keep his eyes from rolling. Can the boy ever just be chill about anything?

“Yeah, yeah ‘course,” Harry begins, moving to loosely hold his arms around his knees. His now permanent manic grin is nearly tearing a line in his face. “But um…you know I was only kidding, right…like, half kidding. Well, more like—like making an empty observation, you know, but—“

“But what?” Louis asks without missing a beat, his voice still just as calm and collected whilst Harry’s red cheeks can be seen even in the near complete darkness of the tent. A single cricket chirps only once in the moment before Harry speaks again, the battery radio picking back up with whispered R&B and somewhat relieving them of any additional silences.

“But—like, but…” Harry begins, eyes drifting off and nowhere as he grips the material at his pants just a bit more. “But if you’re down for it, then I…I don’t…”

Louis practices patience as he simply blinks at the boy, still with his hands down in the dirt within his lap and considerably comfortable. He’s pretty much used to waiting on the boy to say simple things by now. Louis’ currently half thinking about grabbing that last slice of pizza from the box right now as he waits.

“I don’t see any reason not to,” Harry finally finishes, his voice level significantly lower now and his eyes still avoiding Louis’.

Louis raises a hand in the air at the same time as he speaks abruptly, doing the rare thing of making everything just a little less quiet. “A bit of advice,” he begins, gesturing loosely as Harry is now watching him again. “In the future, you might not wanna stammer and ramble like an idiot when someone’s about to bed you.”

“Noted,” Harry replies, nodding wholeheartedly as that infamous dimple in his right cheek appears.

Great, things are getting comfortable again.

There’s a moment where they’re just sitting there, and Louis not knowing what for, since he’s already proposed what they should do now and there should be no reason for a delay. He’s guessing the current round of being in between _sitting_ here and actually _doing_ it is attributed to Harry, Louis simply waiting for the green light.

“So…” Louis begins, moving his head forward to get Harry’s attention. “Are we—“

“Oh _yeah_ , yeah,” Harry stammers, laughing uselessly before just about frog leaping the few feet it takes to get across the interior of the tent and bringing himself to his school backpack that he’d brought along. Louis’ curiosity as to what it is the boy is currently rummaging through his belongings for is silenced when he hears the handling of some material of the plastic persuasion.

Ah, condoms. Louis forgot about those.

Louis can’t help the lazy chuckle that bouts from his lips as he watches the boy’s back. “Why do you even have those, you virgin.”

“Hey, I was always keeping hope, alright?” Harry says over his shoulder, before ripping one of them away from the others. Once he gets that done, his knees are working in order to shuffle his body around and face Louis, Louis happy to see his facial tone is a touch less scarlet than before. “Also, like some guys like, when they're getting _—_ they like to have one on so I thought just in _case—_ “

“Okay, TMI,” Louis mumbles into the hand that he now has splayed over his face.

“Hey, dumbass. You asked,” Harry retorts, Louis not even being able to see what the sound of shuffling is now implying as the boy clearly works his way through the interior of the tent and Louis keeps his hand over his face. “Also, we’re about to have _sex_. I don’t think now’s the time for you to regard the idea of me sucking someone’s dick as cringeworthy.”

Louis removes his hand from his face, just so he can see where Harry is, only to find the boy just having gotten done shuffling on his knees in order to be rested back on his heels in front of Louis, only two or three feet between them as he fiddles with the condom in his hand and appears much more boyish and meek than Louis has seen him in a while.

Louis often takes his moments where he…let’s not say _admires_ … but, objectively _observes_ the boy and just the way he…looks. Because the way he looks is something that makes anyone completely unprepared for the way everything goes out the window when he opens his obnoxious mouth. Now that he’s quiet, and kneeling there, mussed curls staying as tamed as they can behind a scarfed headband, long-sleeved plaid collar shirt styled underneath his short-sleeved graphic tee as though he’s some cross between a pothead and a nerd, Louis just doesn’t get how the fuck he knows this boy.

How he’s apparently about to have sex with this boy.

“Okay, let’s start then,” Louis says halfheartedly, sort of snapping out of it whilst he sits up a bit straighter and motions toward the mess of bed sheets and useless unzipped sleeping bags and pillows and blankets.

It seems literally all traces of that signature cheeky humor and moderate lack of seriousness Harry always has is completely gone now, because he appears more shaken and mute and blank in the face than anything else as he’s moving over to the messy concoction of a “bed”, the rosy tint now returning to his cheeks and his eyes appearing bigger than ever.

“You know we don’t have to do this, right?” Louis says sleepily whilst Harry’s maneuvering in order to lie on his back amongst everything, knees slightly bent and pointed upward, head propped up on top of a pillow. “Like, I’m on board with it, but that’s because I don’t make things a big deal. You know that. Just tell me if—“

“No, no, I’m good,” Harry replies quickly, shaking his head way too many times as Louis shuffles up to him in order to take his place between his legs. “I…I—you know, I trust you most out of like…anyone, so this just makes sense. For my first time. You know.”

“You’re stammering again,” Louis says, eyes lidded as he gently grips both of Harry’s knees, not really paying attention to how his fingers stroke over the fabric at his pants.

Harry’s eyebrows crease together as his eyes fall closed for a moment, Louis beginning to feel a very weird…heat from how close they are right now. “I’ll shut up. Okay, I’ll shut up now.”

He’s always gotten physically close to the boy, so Louis doesn’t really know why the presence of the boy’s body heat is especially…recognizable right now, but it definitely is. Louis would say it’s helping him in calming down, but he’s not even frazzled enough for that to be true. He can only guess that Harry senses it too, and that hopefully it’s helping to relieve _him_ in some way.

“No. _Talk_ ,” Louis says a bit teasingly, one of his hands squeezing the crook of the boy’s knee. “I’m a bit of a rookie at this—especially in the male on male aspect, so…”

“Got it,” Harry replies, eyes still closed, one of his hands noticeably fighting not to clench as it rests among the sheets. “Okay, well. I have to, like…prep.”

It happens quite slowly when Louis raises an eyebrow, still directly staring at Harry’s closed eyelids as though the boy is giving him eye contact. “Harry, we’re in a tent in the middle of the woods, are you really telling me you need to shave or run to the bathroom or shower or something—“

“ _No_ , like…” Harry says, his eyes finally opening, if only barely as they don’t meet Louis’ gaze. He’s literally never seen the boy this flushed. “Ugh…just hand me the lube.”

Louis’ lost on where the boy had even left it until Harry’s gesturing uselessly to the side, bringing Louis to realize he’d left it on the sheets just to the right of them. Louis is compliant and helpful in safely handing it to him, feeling like this is the first time within being in this tent that he’s felt just a bit out of the loop and unsure about anything.

He’s pretty much just watching with eyes that are a tad more open than usual as the boy is working in order to get the liquid spread over his own fingers, before (quite shamelessly, in Louis’ opinion) taking the time to get his own hand to shove into his pants, undoing the zipper and getting it inside with little to no difficulty.

Louis’ not even aware that his lips are parted until he’s forcing himself to close them, now much closer to Harry as he rests on his knees between the boy's hips and just watches him…do it. 

“Oh, that’s…” Louis begins, mouth opening and closing a few times. “That makes sense, actually.”

When Harry’s not saying anything, and instead the only noises heard are clear, wet ones as Harry has his eyes closed again and his tongue stuck out in concentration, Louis chooses to speak again.

“Like—to make sure you’re stretched—like, stretched out enough and everything—“

“ _You’re_ rambling now,” Harry interrupts, a microscopic grin of smugness poking at his cheeks and his eyes staying blissfully closed.

Louis can’t even say anything back, and not due to not caring enough about what’s going on around him to say anything, as per usual.

But because…this is a lot. He can’t even _see_ what Harry’s doing because the boy’s got his hand shoved pretty deep in there without managing to budge his trousers off of his hips much, and already, this is still a _lot_. Louis can even wholly admit he can’t take his eyes off of it, off of the vague movement of the bulge Harry’s made in his pants with his hand.

“You know you have to be hard for this to happen, right?” Harry asks, barely opening one eye and peeking it at Louis.

Louis’ suddenly lifting his hands away from Harry’s knees (where he unconsciously had begun running them up his thighs), holding them uselessly in the air and surely starting to feel like they jumped into this decision with absolutely no brain cells.

“I can’t jack myself off in front of you, man,” Louis says honestly, letting his hands fall into his own lap whilst he shakes his head. “It’s so weird.”

“Okay then,” Harry replies, barely grunting whilst it appears he’s trying to retract the hand that’s in his pants, letting his hips budge up off the sheets for a short moment. Louis’ certain this is the first time in a long time the boy has met eyes with him fully as he lays on his back and Louis remains significantly close above him, practically cemented between his legs. “Trade?”

It doesn’t take much mental searching for Louis to figure out what Harry means, but it does take a lot of mental capability for him to actually open his _mouth_ and say something while Harry’s eyes are barely glowing up at him in the dark tent, his gloss-slick fingers reaching out toward the front of Louis’ pants just a bit timidly.

So he doesn’t say anything.

He just moves forward a great amount so that he’s practically on top of the boy and works to get a hand down his pants in the same motion, Harry not wasting any time in undoing the drawstring at the front of Louis’ pants and assuming the role of just barely palming at Louis’ briefs.

Their faces are really close now, as if it weren’t already really warm between them before. Louis is nearly sweating as he closes his eyes, feels Harry’s breath on his face, and maneuvers his fingers around in order to get them inside the boy.

It’s like the boy releases an easy breath once Louis’ finger has inserted itself, and it also seems as though at the same time, he puts forth more energy into feeling Louis up through his underwear, the both of them completely blind to the parts of each other that they’re fondling, yet still seeming to get it just right. Well, at least, Louis’ pretty _sure_ he’s getting it right, what with the way Harry is just barely beginning to writhe against his finger. Louis _knows_ Harry’s getting it right, because well. He just definitely is. He’s clearly done this before, which shouldn’t be a surprise.

Louis’ face has found a home in Harry’s neck as he’s somehow worked his way up to two fingers, and with his ear so close to the boy’s closed mouth, it’s quite clear Harry’s keeping his moans contained inside his throat as much as he can manage. 

Louis doesn’t have that problem himself though—the whole struggling to stay quiet thing, because he’s always been a relatively quiet guy in bed naturally, so the most he does with the free hand he has is tighten one of his fingers within the strands of Harry’s hair whilst feeling the boy literally grip him up and down through the now moistened fabric of his briefs.

Although Louis himself has always been a quiet one at things like these, he’s never been keen on the _other_ person being quiet though. He likes to hear what’s going on.

It’s like an experimental button when he curves his fingers up just a bit more and it instantly brings about a periodic jerk within Harry’s entire body, a faint and choked sound sprouting from his closed lips.

And then it happens again when Louis pushes a third finger in, now slowly starting up some kind of rhythm in the midst of Harry’s warm, purposeful hand coaxing him more and more, the boy probably legitimately teasing him by still palming him through his briefs.

“There it is…” is the first thing Harry says in a while, quite lowly and smugly once he’s finally feeling Louis’ proper boner through his boxers.

God, now he’s all of a sudden cheeky and arrogant. Was the flustered (and kind of cute) idiot boy thing just an act?

“Yep, um…” Louis begins, having to abruptly close his eyes for a moment in response to Harry finally diving inside of his briefs in order to feel him against his bare palm. “There it is, alright,” he practically breathes.

Harry’s words are a bit delayed when Louis’ curving his fingers in and out again and the boy has to take a moment to gasp in what sort of seems like a breath hiccup. “You feel mine too, right?”

“Mhm,” is all Louis can offer as he swallows, just barely moving against the fist Harry has rested around his dick.

“Okay, so um… _mmm_ ,” Harry begins, barely breathing as well whilst Louis doesn’t let up on fingering him. “Let’s do this, then.”

And… “doing this” is exactly what ensues. Louis’ not even sure he’s still in his own body and in full control of his actions when suddenly he’s got the condom on, and he’s getting himself carefully positioned over the boy and between his hips in order to make a nice landing, and the breathing of the two of them is much more abundant and uneven as it huffs out of their mouths.

“We both agree the kissing thing is weird right?” Louis almost whispers as he grasps Harry at the material of both shoulders.

Harry nods wholeheartedly, both of them now intensely focused at the eyes. “Yeah, never again, remember?” he replies, his response a bit hurried.

“Yeah, yeah, okay,” Louis breathes, mentally bracing himself for it and looking down in between them.

Although this _is_ Louis’ first time like, going _inside_ someone, he doesn’t care about that, and never really has. This is _Harry’s_ first time more importantly, so Louis makes a point of muting everything else outside of this tent (and _wow_ they’re doing this in a tent) as he simply whispers close to Harry and keeps his arms curled up around the boy’s shoulders, continuing to ask him if it’s okay, if he should go slower, if he should completely stop, because Louis knows Harry, he knows he’s the type of guy to keep pushing even when he doesn’t want to. He wants the boy to know that they can stop anytime.

And it would be okay, because right now, as Louis finds himself not even all the way inside of him during only the first stroke, it’s fairly clear that it’s not going to take him long to finish.

He just inches his way in little by little each time, searching Harry’s face as much as the wavering candle light allows him with every movement, and he can’t really tell what the boy’s thinking. All he knows is that he whispers to the boy every few seconds to make sure of everything, and the boy just nods his head and keeps his eyes closed. So Louis continues.

Louis can tell when he’s close to bottoming out by the way Harry’s hands tighten around the material of his shirt, nearly ripping it and bringing Louis to quickly second guess himself.

“I can pull out—“

“No, no stay,” Harry breathes back, breathless for no discernible reason and practically gripping Louis to himself.

So they stay like that for just a bit, Louis’ face somewhat burrowed in the crook of Harry’s neck as his eyes close to the almost-too-much sensation of Harry tight around him like this, intimate as ever, and threatening to steer Louis spiraling upwards quite quickly if any movement starts up at all.

So this is it. Louis is inside of him. They have both had sex now. Well, penetrative, more specifically.

It isn’t long before, with Harry’s encouragement, Louis’ carefully making in and out maneuvers as Harry holds onto him, still not making any noises to indicate what he’s feeling but very much choking down his throat and grasping Louis tightly.

Louis, on the other hand, is already almost there. He knows it’s really cliché and porn-like to say, but Harry is extremely _tight_ , and he’s _warm_ , and everything is just so intimate and burning that Louis fully gets lost in it for a moment, his bottom lip becoming caught between both of his rows of teeth.

The first sign of a response from Harry can be heard in the form of a low hum that escapes his lips, one of his legs having long gotten itself wrapped around Louis’ waist in order to keep him close, so that indicates to Louis that things must be going good enough. They’re still moving quite slow, almost completely stop motion since it’s clearly a totally foreign sensation to Harry, but it feels like they’re making progress.

Louis tries to change his stroke just a bit, figuring that since literally every movement of this thing is up to satisfaction for himself, he needs to remember that Harry probably has like a spot, or something. Maybe. He’s actually not sure. All he knows is that it would be nice to switch it up in order to show he’s actually trying to make Harry react in a positive way.

And it’s clear he achieves exactly that when he moves his hips at an angle just a bit, arms now braced on either side of Harry’s head as they share hot, needy breaths between themselves and the boy bucks his hips up momentarily.

It would be in Louis’ right mind to take off his clothes, due to the sweat building back up upon his face and around his chest as he remains in this bubble of closeness, but he’s not thinking so rationally as he keeps his main focus on stroking against Harry in a very particular way, intent to get him more engaged with all of this.

“Okay,” Harry whispers under his breath after a particular thrust from Louis has him knitting his eyebrows just a bit, pulling the boy on top of him in that much more. So Louis simply tries to keep doing exactly what he’s doing.

And soon, they’re just…having sex. And Harry is fully and earnestly moaning, both legs hoisted around Louis’ waist and all. Louis feels accomplished, honestly.

Both of their eyes have been closed for so long, nothing but heavy, rhythmic breathing and Harry’s occasional “ _mmm_ ”, “ _fuck_ ” and other unintelligible, choked sound, that Louis takes the initiative to open his, only out of his usual, overpowering curiosity. A curiosity for what exactly the experience is that other boys get when they have Harry like this. Obviously, they’ve never had Harry exactly like _this_ (only Louis, let’s give him a round of applause), but it’s common knowledge that Harry’s also given himself sexually to other boys, and Louis wants to know the view that everyone else has had.

And the view is quite something.

It’s actually what brings Louis closer, honestly. Harry’s blissfully closed eyes pairing perfectly with the disarranged mess of his stupid curls that cascade across the wrinkled blankets and pillows, half of his face covered in shadows and the greater half holding a low golden glow, showcasing the slight glimmer of his bottom lip as he bites down on it as much as he can muster, fighting not to make any noise even though his throat is betraying him and letting out moans of pleasure anyway.

Louis hasn’t even realized how much faster he’s started going, his hips moving with a mind of their own as Harry’s eager legs encourage them, Louis’ face finding a home back in Harry’s neck in order to stifle his own sounds, his mouth silently silently opening on its own accord and sucking in air. So obviously, he's really close to losing it. He’s pretty sure even the tent is shaking.

“ _Jesus…”_ Louis whispers, breath shaky in Harry’s ear as he loses control of his movements, pretty much ramming into the boy now as his eyes roll back into his head for probably half a second in the midst of it. He comes to the sound of Harry unabashedly moaning into the air and caressing the back of his neck firmly, the exclamation echoing and Louis trying his best not to let up so as to allow Harry to come too.

He certainly has to slow down, but with the way Harry is still keeping his legs locked around his hips and grinding into him himself, Louis is made to keep going at almost the same pace, just a bit limp upon the boy’s shoulder, eyes open to slits as they take notice of Harry’s fist twisting and grasping onto the sheets, nearly white with sensation.

“Oh my _god_ —“ is the last thing whimpered before Harry’s cut off by coming himself, the boy’s back fully arching and causing his chest to push at Louis’ as he seems to lose himself in it. He probably comes on Louis’ shirt a bit, what with the way they’re situated and all, but Louis can’t feel it, his mind still too focused on coming down from what was easily one of the best orgasms he’s had.

“Holy shit,” Harry breathes, chest sinking in and out and eyes still closed and heavy.

They both don’t say anything for a moment, although it’s very much understood between them that that was good. Even more than good, actually.

And then. Another super short-term goal develops in Louis’ mind.

“Wanna go again?” Louis asks, words muffled into Harry’s shoulder and head still limp and rested.

Harry doesn’t even answer him with words, pretty much communicating that he’s on board with it by shifting his hips up in order to get Louis to budge, before maneuvering both of their positions so that he’s now on top, and Louis is where Harry had previously been lied. Louis can’t even spare a thought as to whether he’s lying in the boy’s come or not when he’s so turned on.

It’s evident where this is headed when Harry’s getting himself comfortable on Louis’ lap, much more upright in position than when Louis’d been on top.

“Can I try riding you?” Harry asks breathlessly, whatever shy boy that had originally been agreeing to this long gone as he grips at the bottom hem of both of his shirts and rolls it up in preparation to lift everything up and off of his head.

Louis nods repeatedly, not even realizing how his hips are only gradually rolling up to meet Harry’s. It’s something he truly can’t control at the moment. Not with Harry now shirtless and glistening at the torso. “Sure, yeah.”

And so it happens. It happens in a blur, actually. All Louis knows is that it’s quite similar to the first time in which they have to start slow in order for Harry to get used to the sensation, Louis not being sure of whether this position makes it easier for Harry or harder.

If it _is_ harder, however, Harry doesn’t let it show, because he appears quite confident in his movements as he comes down upon Louis’ length with slow grinding movements of his hips, Louis having to close his eyes just so he won’t come so soon. He just focuses on squeezing his eyes shut, licking his lips, and keeping his hands braced upon Harry’s hips, for like…balance, or something. He doesn’t know, okay? He doesn’t know anything. Which is probably why he’s still wearing all of his clothes like an idiot and sweating his balls off, all while Harry in all his shirtless glory and sincere, heavenly moans are mocking him to hell.

“Fuck, Harry,” Louis breathes at some point, swallowing and wondering how Harry is so good at this already. In this position all Louis can do is just lay here, awestruck and stimulated in dangerous ways.

When they gradually pick up pace, Harry seeming to have now gotten used to this position and coming down upon Louis with less hesitance, it’s pretty much over for Louis. His dick is going to be just about useless after this. No way it’ll be able to do anything in the future.

Every thrust from Harry is knocking the breath out of Louis, Louis figuring he’s just there for the ride and trying to hold off for as long as humanly possible.

“Hey,” Harry pants while Louis is seeing sparks behind his closed eyes and barely able to hold onto Harry’s hips.

“Please don’t talk to me,” Louis begins, head arching back a bit as he thrusts into it with the little bit of control that he can, all while Harry’s maintaining the upbeat rhythm and coming down onto him without missing a beat. “…while I’m this close,” he finishes after a while.

“Just saying,” Harry begins, his hand that’s laid on Louis’ chest in order to keep himself steady bunching his shirt significantly and gripping him tightly whilst he takes a few moments to whimper unabashedly, mouth hung open and all. “It’ll be messy licking everything up off…your shirt.”

Louis’ spinning mind and overwhelmingly roused senses at every corner of his being don’t even get to process what Harry means before he feels the bottom of the shirt being pushed up to his chest and held there by Harry whilst the boy doesn’t let up even a little on riding him, nearly driving the boy underneath him over the edge as Louis’ entire torso now remains exposed and most likely drenched in sweat.

Louis’ completely given up on keeping a hold of Harry’s hips as he now has one hand being bitten into by his own teeth, and the other one caressed tightly against his forehead. He’s pretty sure this is about to be the hardest he’s ever come in his life.

He’s fairly certain what does it for him is hearing another one of those enthusiastic, raw, open mouthed moans emerge from Harry’s lips just as he’s clenching himself around the boy, because after that, everything is pretty much white behind his eyes for quite a long, almost overbearing moment as he arches his hips into Harry’s movements greatly and feels the crown of his head touching the pillows. It probably was also strengthened by the fact that through it all, the boy doesn’t stop or slow down, not even halfway.

Louis is a limp doll of overstimulation long after he’s already came and Harry’s still going. His own eyes even still remain closed, his lips mouthing at his fingers as he shudders and wills his body to calm down, even though that’s near impossible because, again, Harry is still going…and like, bouncing…and moaning curse words into the tent that’s in the middle of the fucking public park, outside at night.

When Harry comes, just as the boy had implied, Louis feels it all over his chest, warm and foreign, although he barely gets to let the feeling of it marinate in his mind before he feels Harry’s tongue run over his nipple, lapping it all up within seconds.

Louis has to exert much energy in order to pull his eyes open at the sensation of this, because he just wants to see it. He really does. And it’s just as unreal and hot and fervent and candid as Louis would’ve thought, the boy flattening his tongue against every surface of Louis’ sweaty skin where his own come has painted him. Fuck, this is too much.

And when it seems the boy is nearly finished as he gets the last of it at the bottom of Louis’ neck, his tongue pretty much drags itself up and into Louis’ mouth, Louis not even resisting for a miniscule second as he immediately falls in line with his lips, even sitting up a little and strangely eager to share the taste of Harry between the both of their mouths.

Yes, they’d literally just agreed before this had started that the whole kissing thing wouldn’t happen.

But it just makes _sense_ in this moment. It simply _flows_ , and they both obviously feel it.

This kiss is much sloppier than the first one they’d shared, although it matches the low intensity as it remains languid and post-coital, Harry’s head feeling heavy where Louis caresses him at both sides of his jaw. 

Louis may be new at what they’ve done today, but he’s certainly no stranger to tasting someone after they’ve come, so he doesn’t see anything wrong with the salty, tangy taste shared between their barely grazing tongues as Harry’s lips weave in and out of his.

The kissing doesn’t go on for an eternity, but it definitely lasts until they’re both quite slumped, the two of them still heaving and lax on top of one another once Louis’ finally let go of the boy’s chin and allowed him one last, thorough peck.

It literally feels like they’ve just run a marathon.

That can’t be too far off though, can it? This _has_ to be the energy equivalent—or probably even a greater _exertion_ than running a full marathon. Especially for Harry, and the erm…stamina he’d showcased today.

Harry’s hand remains heavy on top of Louis’ chest where he’s still exposed with his shirt bunched near his neck, and they just lay there like that for quite a while. Dazed. Breathing. Heavily. Louis’ eyes closed and his ears just now remembering that a radio exists somewhere beyond them and is still softly humming with grainy lullabies. He assumes Harry's probably going through the same re-insertion of his senses, his lids also down over his drowsy eyes.

He’s pretty sure they rest there idly and tiredly for almost an hour, before Louis’ the first one to shuffle just a bit, mumbling inaudibly about how they should change into the sleeping clothes they’d packed, Harry lazily grunting and agreeing that they should wear something “cleaner” to sleep in and that he should also probably take out his contacts. So they do exactly that. In the dark. After sex. Before sleep.

And they’re knocked out next to each other before they can even get more time to over think much of anything.


	5. Chapter 5

How the fuck is Harry supposed to concentrate right now.

On fucking _anything_.

He’s currently in woodshop class, supposedly trying to construct some kind of small table (his partner knows most of everything they’re supposed to be doing honestly), he has safety goggles huge and clad upon his face, he’s tapping his foot wildly, and he’s deathly afraid of how injured he could get himself if he doesn’t pay attention to what he’s doing very closely as he uses a table saw in order to get one of the wooden pieces to the length it needs to be. He could literally lose a _finger_.

But for some reason, those concerns continue to take a backseat in favor of obsessing over the fact that he and Louis had sex. He and Louis had _amazing_ sex, _twice_ , and he literally doesn’t know how he’s supposed to conjure up the ability to think about anything else.

There are three more days of school left for him, which basically means high school is just about over and done, so maybe that’s another thing that he could think about in order to get his mind off of this.

But it just doesn’t work.

It _can’t_ work, because as Harry’s standing over the table saw, adjacent to his partner and still dangerously not paying mind to the wooden piece he’s supposed to be carefully moving, he can _feel_ it in his _legs._ It’s definitely not as crucial as the morning after, but _—_

The sharp, puncturing sensation he feels in his index finger immediately brings him to yelp, pulling his hand away and shaking it out wildly, all while his partner is reaching out toward him and hurriedly inquiring about if he’s okay or not.

And all Harry can think about as he’s bringing the side of his finger up to his mouth in order to suck the blood out is—he and Louis had _sex_.

That will most certainly go down as the infamous Camping Trip. Whenever anyone mentions camping now Harry will react to it with a hot flash, remembering how feverishly encompassing it felt, the heat of having Louis inside of him, how the boy displayed his pleasure in those low, swallowed shy sounds. He can’t believe that was actually _real._ He lost his virginity to Louis, of all people.

He guesses he should’ve seen it coming anyway, because as they’d discussed right before it happened, it made sense. No blood on their hands, no distrust, they’re not going to go around spreading rumors about the other over it, they’re just going to handle it like adults and go about their lives. It’s amazing.

They also kissed again. But that was Harry’s fault.

It’s just weird, doing sexual things with a guy and then not kissing him before, during, or after it. It’s not something that Harry’s used to. While that was his first concern though, he’d also really wanted to know if Louis had meant it when he’d said he didn’t want to do it again. If he’d meant it when he said the first time was weird and that they should stop. That was clearly a lie.

What partially brings Harry out of his thoughts (and also to stop sucking excess blood out of his now pale finger) is the fact that Ezra pops into the room, emerging from the entrance door to the classroom from the back and clearly delivering some paperwork from whatever class he’d come from, right to the teacher in this classroom as he makes his way up to the front desk in order to hand it to her, all while Harry has made the not-so-subtle move of backing himself into a corner, bumping into the sink, finding he has nowhere to go, and bending over behind the nearest projector in order to disguise himself in the world’s worst hiding attempt known to man.

Why exactly is _he_ the one trying to avoid the guy right now, even though it was Ezra who’d ghosted him? The things he does for the sake of others.

It becomes clear that he’s been spotted quite soon, when he can hear footsteps approaching him from behind, bringing him to quickly play everything off as though he’s picking up a pencil from the ground (which is convenient because there _is_ a pencil on the ground).

“Harry?” comes his voice, questioning and dreamy the way Harry remembers it, bringing Harry to have to contain and collect himself as he swipes up the pencil from the ground and moves to get up, of course, knocking his head into the projector on the way up.

“Hi,” Harry replies after a moment, rubbing at his head with one hand and waving the pencil around with the other. “I had, um…I had just dropped this.”

The way the guy smiles at him is so sweet and genuine, his rows of ethereal white teeth being the only things more blinding and lustrous than his neatly parted, short dirty blonde hair. The delight his appearance brings even almost makes Harry _forget_ that the boy had ghosted him. It’s just, he’s so cute, and he appears happy to see him, and he’s got these nicely tight khaki pants on that remind Harry of how he’s _clean_ and _fit_ and _wholesome_. 

“No need to explain yourself,” Ezra laughs.

Harry laughs right back, feeling just a tad red cheeked in seconds. “I know.”

“Listen,” he begins, and Harry already presses his lips together in preparation for it. He’s going to tell Harry how shit he is, how their date was horrible, and right now, Harry feels that being left suspended in the air was a much better feeling than this.

“I know I’d kinda left you hanging there for a bit, after that date,” he continues, hands sliding into the pockets of his jean jacket. “And I’m sorry about that. I enjoyed it, really. I enjoy you.”

Harry’s lips only twitch into a grin for half a moment as green eyes hold gaze with another set of green eyes, and he’s not sure why the boy is still buttering him up. Just rip the band-aid off already.

“It’s just…I’d been going through a lot of personal stuff, honestly,” he continues, face dropping a bit as he looks down at his shoes. “Hopefully we can like, start back up again? I’d really like to.” The innocent, hopeful air to his tone as he dances his gaze back up to Harry’s is intoxicating, Harry’s heart stilling completely whilst he comes to terms with the realization that this isn’t a rejection.

“Um…” Harry begins, one hand working through his hair and the other hand stupidly holding onto a yellow pencil. “Yeah. Yeah, of course.”

Ezra looks like quite the stud, the way his lips curve into a cool, effortless grin in satisfaction, Harry mirroring him in goofily grinning right back. “Awesome,” he replies, feet already shifting in order to head for the back where the door to the classroom is, his finger pointing over his shoulder. “I’ve gotta go back to class. But text me.”

Harry actually can’t stop grinning as he watches him leave, an awkward hand gesturing after him, even though the boy can’t see it. “Sure thing.”

After he’s done smiling at himself like an idiot and digging the toe of his shoe into the ground out of bashfulness, he catches the appearance of his woodshop partner, who seems to be staring at him a bit vexingly, the stringy haired girl impatient about how he hasn’t come back over to help in a while.

“Sorry,” Harry says, striding right back up in order to get in position to saw some wood.

Well, it seems like his life may be coming together.

Or is it becoming a mess, though?

Because it only takes one minute after Ezra has exited through that door for Harry’s thoughts to drift back to Louis, his hands hardly supporting the table saw and his eyes foggy and blank. Yeah, he’s finally got some insight as to why the one guy he’s liked in a while has been flaking on him (even though, was that a _real_ reason to not give him as much as a text?) but he’s just had sex with his best friend, and maybe that’s supposed to _come_ with some things now, bringing it to not really make sense that he’s about to start back up with Ezra.

He can’t stop thinking about the morning after.

They didn’t wake up naturally, because their sleep had actually been cut short due to a dragonfly landing on Harry’s nose and causing him to absolutely _flip_ the _fuck_ out, rightfully so. He’d ended up both waking Louis up, and thrashing the whole tent into a sideways tilt, exposing them both to the sunny outside world once he’d finally waved his arms wildly enough and ran through the tent like a hurricane in order to get the dragonfly out. It was a fairly adventurous way to wake up.

The adventure could also be credited to how they’d found a fine stuck to the outside of their tent, because apparently they’d needed some kind of permission to camp in a publically owned site. To be honest, Harry’s just glad it wasn’t a fine for public indecency. Or exhibitionism. He’s not sure of whether or not that’s a crime in some situations.

But yeah, that’s how the speedy journey to waking up and preparing to leave in the morning began, Harry quickly finding once he got to his feet that he had a bit of a limp to his walk. Neither of them said anything about it, and Harry tried to disguise it as much as he could in order to keep things from being awkward, but it was just too… _there_. Hard to miss.

In terms of how severe the limp was _that_ day, it’s a lot less noticeable now to anyone that isn’t immediately in Harry’s body. Or Louis. But _Jesus_ , that day? Harry might as well have had crutches.

As amazing as the sex was, and as thrilling as the whole entire day was, and as glowing as Harry has been since that morning, Harry just…really hopes this doesn’t make anything weird.

It’s not news that Louis often does things in the moment, _right_ when he feels like doing it, with no regard for future consequences or predicaments, and usually Harry does his best to still steer the boy away from potentially harmful situations. But _Harry’d_ felt it was a good idea too. It _had_ to have been a good idea. Like, the sex was _good_. How could this be bad?

This phrase has been overused and is almost void of meaning by now since the two of them have utilized it to justify things so much, but…they _are_ doing everything. Harry can’t say that he’d never been curious as to what it would be like to get with Louis, and he safely assumes Louis can’t say the same either, which is why what happened, happened. They’d needed a way to satisfy their curiosities, and that night was simply the perfect time for it. It doesn’t have to be a big deal.

This just…can’t be like last time. When they’d kissed. It was too awkward, they’d distanced themselves for a few days, and Harry would rather eat a shoe than go through that again. Even _he’d_ found himself avoiding their locker out of sheer nerves related to the shifting of their dynamic, and he shames himself for that. He’s just going to see Louis at their locker at the end of the day today, and they are going to run smoothly, business as usual.

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

“Can’t believe they won’t let us eat outside of here during lunch anymore,” Harry complains, plastic knife scraping against the surface of the table as his eyebrows are drawn together in agitation.

“You know they always do that at the very end of the year,” Niall replies confusedly, biting into his perfectly made sandwich, which Harry has come to realize he prepares in exactly the same way every day.

“I just don’t wanna be in here,” Harry replies, even being able to hear Liam loudly laughing at whatever is so funny from here. 

As much as he’s tried not to make it the case, his focus has been on Louis’ regular lunch table of athletes, notable students, and power couples, even though, as per usual, he can’t see much from here. He can just hear them, and sense them, and it’s even more excruciating today, having Louis still being so sucked into them while he, himself, hasn’t even seen the boy since that day.

His confusion and turmoil and conflict has just been snowballing, and he’s outrageously antsy at this point with the need to just come in contact with Louis and confirm that things are _normal_.

“These last few days are pretty dragging, aren't they?” Niall asks eventually, watching the way Harry is making faint scratches in the table with the plastic knife.

“I guess,” Harry replies through tight lips, still not letting up on the knife. He’s always had a habit of carving shapes into tables, desks, counters, when he’s especially on edge, hyperfixated on something and desperate for an outlet.

The feeling of Niall softly bumping his shoulder against Harry’s moves him just a bit. “Lighten up. Only three more days left.” And then the boy is putting his sandwich in its container, making an act of packing his things back into his lunchbox as Harry’s gaze moves to watch him.

“And just where do you think you’re going?” Harry asks, watching the boy scoot his seat back and prepare to stand up, all while offering his farewells to the other attendants at their table.

“Oh. I’m hanging out with Zayn,” he says, clearly struggling to contain the happiness in his tone as he brings the straw of his juice pouch to his lips and sips at it, lunchbox and backpack now in tow. “Better late than never” is what he mumbles as he walks away, Harry’s eyes following him on his long journey across the lunchroom and to that infamous, loud, annoying table. He can’t even see the boy anymore. It’s as though they’d sucked him in, initiation style.

Can’t believe _he’d_ gotten accepted at their table with open arms before _Harry._ This is preposterous.

“Styles.”

Harry’s pulled out of his deeply abstruse thoughts and made to turn his eyes toward the shrill, adult voice from behind him, finding Ms. Dickerson and her faded gray bob haircut, staring down disappointedly at the way he has the knife upright and digging into the surface of the cafeteria table.

He’s already lowering his chin at himself and muttering the word “fuck” before she can even finish telling him that he has detention.

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

Harry will not chicken out. He will _not_ chicken out.

Right now, everyone in the school is supposed to be using this time to clean out their lockers, and currently, as Harry stands against the wall at the corner of the hallway his locker isn’t on, he can clearly see that Louis is already at their locker, halfheartedly working on the combination and regularly looking like he has a hangover as he rubs at his eyes and keeps those signature sunglasses in his hair.

It’ll be so obvious if Harry never comes. It would be the icing on the ruined friendship cake, because it would be very apparent that Harry is avoiding their locker.

So he has no other choice than to find himself walking up to it, as smoothly as he can muster, Louis not even taking notice of him in his peripheral as he’s finally pulling the locker open.

“Let’s not pretend you actually have anything of value in there,” Harry says once he comes up, resting his elbows comfortably on top of the open locker.

“You’re right,” Louis replies, not even turning his eyes toward Harry, and speaking as though the boy isn’t even there, although he’s responding to him. “I’ll just leave the rotting bag of my age-old Honey Bun in there for you to clean up.”

This brings Harry to open and close his mouth defensively, because it becomes clear how that’s very much what Louis’ actually going to make him do as he’s hoisting up his backpack onto one shoulder and preparing to retreat.

“But—“

“I have to go help out with soccer conditioning anyway,” Louis replies, adjusting his backpack on his shoulder a bit and patting Harry’s arm twice on his departure. “Catch you later, Styles.”

And—

Styles? Harry was convinced he’d come a long way from being called _Styles_ by the boy (something that peaked in junior year and then made a speedy disappearance) yet here the nickname is again, strange and foreign in the air once it lingers after the boy is gone.

Well, that was. Normal, Harry guesses. Nonchalant, uncaring Louis is normal, right?

Harry presses his eyes shut as he lets his forehead rest against the closed locker next to his own, wishing it all just wasn’t so frustrating and mindboggling. He just doesn’t fucking _know_.

When he’s lifting his head up and taking the one step toward their open locker in order to do exactly what the school has directed everyone to do, he’s not sure if it’s bittersweet or not, the fact that the first thing his eyes meet, straight ahead and taped to the back wall of their locker, is a photo of him and Louis, young, dumb, and looking so deep into their awkward years that Harry slightly cringes at how they’d ever thought this was a good idea to put up. It’s a picture that his mother had taken of them, sometime in freshman year, long after Louis was already an athlete, with his long hair bordering on helmet, and Harry’s cherub curls framing his face like a bonnet. 

Harry remembers that exact moment his mother had asked to take their picture right quick; it was after one of Louis’ first games, which is why he’s wearing a really early version of his jersey, the red polyester of it slightly drooping off of him, and they had just been watching late night cartoons, continuing to promise his mother that they would go to bed after each episode, because she kept pestering them and it was a school night. Louis’d quickly put Harry into a chokehold in an instant after she’d asked for the picture, resulting in a sort of a blurry, energetic level of photo where the light coming in from the television casts this innocent glow on the both of them, Louis even managing to fully smile in the midst of it. 

Louis used to smile so much, contrary to popular belief. He wasn’t always the way he is now, and this reminds Harry of that.

Harry simply grips the photo with his fingers, rips it away from the tape that’s holding it up, and slides it into the side pocket of his backpack, intent to get a move on with this whole locker cleaning thing.

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

They haven’t seen or spoken to each other in three days.

Yep, the very last three days of school, absolute silence on both ends.

And okay, Harry’s aware there’s probably been times in the midst of these four long years where they were too busy and out of sync and on the move and would unknowingly not see or speak to each other in the same amount of time, but this is different. For one, _neither_ of them are busy, or at least not swamped enough to not have any free time to spare. And for two, it’s literally the _end_ of senior year; it’s a time where friends are hugging each other tightly and crying, where teachers are giving their longtime favorite students gifts, where right now, just as Harry’s been let out of his last high school class _ever_ after the ringing of the bell, he’s immediately met in the hallway with the blinding swarm of almost every student throwing their folders, assignments, tests, supplies, straight into the air and rejoicing with everyone they surround themselves with. _That’s_ why it’s different this time.

Harry has no reason to go to his locker today, since the thing is completely empty now and there are no more assignments for him to take care of, but he just makes a stop by it anyway, having to struggle moving through many animated bodies that are filling every inch and corner of the halls, as well as how papers and pencils and erasers keep hitting him in the face as they’re continuously being thrown.

Harry can already see it before he’s reached the locker, figuring there’s no reason to walk all the way to it. Louis’ not there. Louis’ not anywhere.

It’s actually starting to dawn on Harry in this exact moment, his arms crossed over his chest and his mind contemplative as he gets carelessly shoved in the midst of all the hallway energy. How long has Louis…not been anywhere? Sure, for the last three days that Harry’s had to endure an empty stomach in the cafeteria, he’d _assumed_ the boy was at his usual table, but he didn’t ever actually _see_ him—he never does, because the table’s always been too far and blocked by too many crowds. 

But paired with the fact that the boy has also not been seen at their locker, both before and after school, dragging his tired feet down the hallways, or even getting into his car in the senior parking lot, Harry’s starting to think he hasn’t been _here_ in a while.

As his growing concern for what he’s concluded within his head continues, Harry finds himself inside of his car not long after all the assignment-throwing festivities, where everyone around him in the parking lot is hugging, loudly discussing their plans for the summer, blasting music with all of their windows down, and here he is…waiting.

He simply snorts as he keeps his fingers in his lap and fiddles with them, eyes intensely darting and focused on the happenings outside of his car as people approach their vehicles, and he’s waiting for anything. 

But nothing comes.

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

“Wait, _wait_ ,” his mother pleads, Harry huffing as she uses her fingers to move his hair around upon his head, Harry sat in the passenger seat of the car and having desperately tried to exit this thing several times by now.

“Mom, it won’t matter anyway,” Harry says, reaching behind himself for the door handle as the lady tucks a few strands behind his right ear. “I’m gonna be shoving a hat over it. Remember?”

His mother’s gasp is faint and unfeigned in response, Harry already hearing a car honking behind them as they remain pulled up to the curb where Harry’s supposed to be getting out in order to join the other graduates before the ceremony. “You will not be _shoving_ anything on, surely. Not with how much time I spent on your hair.”

Harry rolls his eyes but nods his head nonetheless, opening the door behind him as he prepares to head out. “Okay, okay.”

He’s practically fully out of the car when his mother is reaching for him again, holding him by both cheeks and moving to press a rushed kiss into one of them. Harry bites his tongue in response to this never ending moment—she’s _literally_ going to see him again once he walks across that stage in a few minutes, but he figures it’s best to let her be all dramatic and passionate, just so she can get it out the way.

He’s beyond grateful to find himself closing the car door eventually, power walking toward the building where the ceremony is to be held, already bearing the knowledge that he’s astronomically late, given how he was supposed to arrive here an hour ago. His mother had really gotten carried away with his hair, apparently trying to repair the damage that the “homeless man scarf” had been doing to it.

Since he’s so late though, that should mean that everyone who’s supposed to be here, should be here right now. Which means that Louis should be here.

Except when Harry’s joining everybody in the venue, backstage of where they’re supposed to be entering the ceremony from, he doesn’t see him. Anywhere. In his defense though, it’s hard to see anything with everyone, including himself, draped in the same flowing, burgundy gown, some with the caps already upon their heads and others twirling the wretched things around their fingers and making everything harder on Harry’s eyes. But even like this, Harry would normally be able to spot him in an instant. He’d just be able to _sense_ the chill, laid-back bloke that reeks of not caring about this entire ceremony, and it would pull Harry towards the boy like a metal detector.

The first place he checks after his metal detector senses fail, of course, are his group of friends, and he doesn’t have to do much searching to hear Zayn, loud and laughing as always, somewhere within the sea of burgundy heads. Although he’s clearly not graduating with everyone right now as he remains the one speck of human who's clad in regular clothing, it appears as though he’s taken the time to come and support his older friends today like the all-around pleasing person he is.

“Hey look…” comes Zayn’s voice, as he’s right in the middle of animatedly talking about something with his group and catches sight of Harry’s approach. “It’s Henry!”

Harry only closes his eyes briefly, nostrils flared as he takes the time to internally tell himself that this is the last time he’ll probably ever see the boy. No use in correcting him.

“Yeah, um…” Harry begins, coming to a stop as he infiltrates their circle and pokes at the graduation cap he’s holding in his hands. “Where’s shithead?” He tries to sound as casual as possible, not wanting anyone to know the internal hurricane of panic that has been building up to this very moment.

When Zayn simply offers a shrug, the rest of these soccer guys and jocks and cool guy friends following in suit, the tightness of Harry’s chest is truly something he hasn’t ever experienced before.

“No idea, man,” another one of them answers, Harry a bit alarmed with their lack of concern.

“I've already checked in with him,” Liam chimes in, Harry not even having noticed the boy was there as he seems to be speaking from right outside of the circle. He makes his appearance even more known by wedging himself into it, his facial expression bearing the usual dismissive aversion he has to Harry. “I’m sure if he wanted you to know where he was…you’d know.”

And…Harry doesn’t quite know how to take that. It sounds like it’s supposed to be hurtful, coming out of Liam’s mouth, but mostly, Harry just wants to know whether or not it means that he _knows_ where Louis is, that the boy is _coming—_ just anything, really. They can do the silent rivalry, petty stuff at another time, preferably.

Harry doesn’t really get to say anything in response, not realizing he hasn’t voiced himself and instead just opened and closed his mouth like a lost fish, until the rest of them have tuned his existence out and gone back to listen to whatever story Zayn had been telling them.

Harry’s feet are moving backwards, the boy suddenly finding himself at a loss. For breath, for words, for thoughts. All he focuses on is closing his mouth and breathing through his nose, the crowdedness of all of the graduating class and their draping gowns and their enthusiastic conversations suddenly becoming too much.

He just needs someone to talk to.

And one hundred percent of the time, that someone is Louis, but now, since the troubles Harry is facing at the current moment are _about_ Louis, _Louis_ is the absolute last person that he needs to talk to. And it’s so fucking frustrating, and crippling, and it’s making him feel trapped in his head.

_Should_ he text Louis? That would be the simple way to get a solid answer, right? It’s just that now, things are backwards between them and Harry doesn’t know if his worry will push the boy away or work to mend things. It’s never had to be this hard, just talking to his best friend.

He just needs a breather. 

So he sets out to find exactly that, whether it’s in the form of some corner where less people reside, or some nearby bathroom where he would hopefully still be able to hear if they’re about to start the ceremony or not.

Before he can even get very far within the masses of the students, however, a brand new idea comes across his mind once he spots Niall, standing off by himself and fogging up his glasses with his mouth in order to wipe them off, and he’s grabbing the boy’s wrist and pulling him to the side before he can even think about it.

“What—“

“Me and Louis fucked,” Harry says, his voice hushed, but still bustling with energy and basically achieving the exact opposite of a whisper, judging by the way Niall’s vexed, annoyed expression changes into something more lost and wordless as he slowly fixes his glasses back over his eyes. “Like, _fucked_. We fucked like bunnies!”

He couldn’t be more grateful that everyone’s too busy being much louder than him in this crowded back area to be able to listen in on their conversation.

And then he’s let down when Niall _still_ manages to raise his voice loud enough to garner everyone’s attention within a five country radius.

“You had _sex_ with—“

Harry slapping a hand over his dangerously loud mouth is the only thing that saves them from being exposed, the few eyes that had turned towards them blinking and inquisitive as Harry offers them nothing other than a polite grin, as though there’s nothing to see over here.

Once Niall’s wide eyes have dimmed just a little, and it appears they may have this conversation to themselves again, Harry grips the boy’s arm and pulls him into a quieter, lonely area, the both of them merely seeing shadows of each other as they remain mostly out of view of everyone.

“So…” Niall begins, now making more effort to whisper, his fingers scratching at the cap that’s fitted to his head. “You and Louis…thought it was a good idea to—“

“I _know!”_ Harry whisper screams, already starting to feel a thickness forming in his throat, just in reaction to how Niall isn’t giving him comfort about it and basically _confirming_ that it was a bad idea. “I just don’t know what to do now—like, what’s going on now or _if_ there’s anything going on and I’m just reading into it but it doesn’t _seem_ like I’m reading into it since Louis is just _disappearing now_ and I’m not a crier I’m _really_ not a crier, but—“

Niall slapping his hands over both of Harry’s shoulders is what halts his rant, Harry still having his palm over his own forehead, his chest almost heaving with worry, and his eyes stinging just a tad and threatening to run themselves dry.

“And you won’t be a crier,” Niall says calmly, Harry dropping his hand and sniffling only once. “Especially not today. Not on one of the most rewarding days of your life.”

It’s fitting that Niall the nerd is making a big deal out of how the achievement of graduation should outweigh any other grievances today, but Harry will let him make this point, because it’s helping to ease him a bit as he strokes a finger at his eye where it seemed the tears were about to fall, now feeling much tougher and defiant to letting his emotions get to him.

“Okay,” Harry sniffles.

Niall lets his hands slide off of the boy’s shoulders, the unconditional attention from the boy in front of Harry allowing him to feel genuinely listened to for the first time in what has been several days, although it feels like _ages_.

“Now, just calmly lay it out for me,” Niall says, voice low and easy. “What’s wrong?”

Harry squeezes his eyes shut for a moment, fingers pinching the material of his grad cap and teeth moving tightly against each other.

“My mind is just…” Harry begins, finding the words to say and endlessly frustrated. “My mind is too much of a fucking mess to lay this all out. Like…why did this happen.” It’s obviously a question, but it exits his mouth in the form of a calm, direct statement, as though he’s not sure if he even wants an answer.

“Well, you’re both sexually attracted to each other, obviously,” Niall answers for him anyway, the boy never having been one to stray away from a blaringly correct answer. “And trust each other, too.”

“Okay…” Harry continues gently, eyes focused down below as he still struggles to process everything and simmer his emotions. “So why is this bad. Why is it bad. Why am I freaking out about it.”

“Because you just had sex with your _best_ _friend_ , of course,” Niall replies, as though it’s simple math. He places one hand on Harry’s shoulder again as he attempts to gain his eye contact with his question. “Good sex, I’m guessing?”

Harry nods dolorously, never imagining he’d be so sad to admit to having enjoyable sex with someone.

“Okay, so,” Niall begins, thoughtful as he speaks. “You had good sex with your best friend, so as a gay man, it’s nearly impossible for you not to develop feelings for him.”

Harry brings his eyes up to meet Niall’s, directly for the first time in the many moments they’ve been stood here, mostly separate from the student body. He doesn’t know whether or not he wants to strangle him for trying to break everything down to a science, uncaring of telling someone what they need to hear.

“It’s um…” Niall begins, scratching behind his ear under the pressure of Harry’s unamused eyes on him. “It’s not hard to break down, really.”

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

Graduation happens. No Louis.

They even skip his name when everyone is walking across the stage, which means the school must’ve known ahead of time that he wouldn’t be there.

Harry wonders if he’s the only one in their class who wasn’t there.

Immediately after the ceremony and right outside of it, Harry’s pulled into a swarm of family greetings and shouts of his name from left and right and invitations to join in pictures with the people who like him and the people who did plays with him and the people who he’d shared multiple detentions with, and through all of it, he can’t bring himself to fully be _joyous_ and _in the moment_ , which fucking sucks.

It’s during a long round of family pictures with grandparents, cousins, aunts, uncles, and other unnamed folks who he rarely ever sees, when his mother asks about the boy.

“ _Oh_ , where’s Louis?” she asks abruptly, camera in hand and mind dead set on taking as many photos as possible. “You guys need a picture!”

When Harry doesn’t answer immediately, still retreating from position where he’d been posing around his grandparents and letting his mother take the picture, she makes her way over, clearly disquieted and concerned even in her bright wedged heels that she’d happily bought for today.

“I…” Harry begins, brows knit as he looks at his shoes for a bit. “I don’t know.”

This doesn’t deter her for even half a second as she continues to drill him, clearly not understanding that he’s not saying he doesn’t know where Louis is right _now_. He doesn’t know where Louis is _at all_.

“Wanna try and find him?” she asks, hand stroking through his hair. “People are _everywhere_ out here, he’s probably just around the back—“

“ _No,_ ” Harry answers, the demanding tone of his voice quieting her instantly. “He’s not anywhere.”

She lowers the camera in her hand hesitantly as she starts to understand, Harry’s extra family members still conversing and catching up around them.

“Did you try calling him?” she asks softly, eyes fixed in concern.

“No, but—“

“Harry.” She looks all but proud, arms crossing over each other upon her chest and face going hard with disapproval. “That’s ridiculous. Please don’t tell me you guys are fighting. Now of all times.”

Harry shrugs one shoulder, feeling like an uncooperative child as he wishes she’d just leave him alone about it. “I dunno,” he replies, pursing his lips boredly. “Maybe. I don’t know.”

She lets a disgruntled groan leave her lips, practically dismissing the whole problem, before going back up to her sister who’d attended, rallying everyone up for more photos and evidently wiping her hands of this since Harry isn’t being very responsive or helpful.

He and Louis have generally had some heated “fights” before over the years, and it seems she’s just reacting in her usual way of knowing they’re being childish and will get over it soon, but that isn’t the case here.

The case is, Harry might have feelings for his best friend now.

And there may be no turning back from this one.

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

Although Harry wasn’t really thinking there was anything wrong with going home after the ceremony and spending the rest of the night miserably stuffed in his bed and eating junk food, he came to find out how that’s actually the most pathetic thing to do right after graduation, when everyone else is out partying, going drinking with their fake I.D.’s, streaking and shit.

Even _Niall_ is stepping out of his box to go be socially loose tonight, which is the only reason Harry is even aware that he should be making more of himself.

Apparently, there’s one of many house parties going on tonight, and Niall just so happened to get urged to come to one by none other than Zayn Malik, and honestly, Harry doesn’t even want to unpack whether there’s anything going on there or not (and it definitely doesn’t have anything to do with his last semester crush on Zayn and thinking the guy definitely wasn’t into guys, _nothing_ to do with that).

So that’s how Harry finds himself only present in body, completely absent in mind as he and Niall are walking side by side in an upscale neighborhood that they had to climb a massive, golden gate in order to enter.

He’d been so deep in throwing his cares of high school away and immersing himself in his messy bed that he’d even gone and taken his contacts off as soon as he’d gotten home after the graduation ceremony, which is why he’s currently wearing his handy glasses due to being too lazy to put the things back on.

These houses are super big. They’re the kind of houses one only sees while driving on a main road and admiring them off to the side, wondering what kinds of people live in those ridiculous things.

He guesses they’ll find out soon enough, since the booming sound of party music continues to grow in volume with every step they take along the pebbled, fancy sidewalk.

Harry really does not want to do this.

As much as he hates to admit it, he just wants to sulk. Sulk in all of the emotions he knows he’s going to be feeling soon, how _now_ Ezra is texting him again, _right_ when he’s in the middle of all this internal suffering bullshit. He just wants some cliché ice cream chick flick movie night all to himself. Is that too much to ask for?

But maybe this party will be good for him. Maybe he’ll be able to drink and uselessly talk enough to get his mind off things. 

He’s a little confused, however, because he’d been aware of pretty much every party that was to be going on tonight, _except_ this one. Which is odd, because it’s obviously probably the biggest house that’s hosting a party. And as they’re traveling up toward the grand entrance pathway leading to the front steps (there’s even a _fountain_ out in the front yard), the few people smoking outside and the radiant changing lights seen through the windows make it even weirder, the fact that Harry hadn’t even known this party existed.

And he’s immediately met with his answer to why that is when the host is coming to the door, preparing to open it for whoever’s just rang the doorbell.

“Niall Horan,” is what first comes out of Liam’s mouth, perky and pleasantly surprised as he swings the door open, but quickly flattening a bit at the last syllable once he’s aware of who the boy’s brought with him. “…and you.” He doesn’t even attempt to hide the deflated nature of his facial expression once his eyes are now focused and directed at Harry.

Harry shrugs it off, however, just as he’s gotten so used to shrugging off Liam’s blatant hostility for most of his entire high school career now. He simply pushes his glasses more comfortably upon his nose and offers half of a grin, already following behind Niall as the boy’s clasping hands with Liam and making his way in.

“Yeah, it’s me. Wasn’t a closed invite, was it?” Niall asks.

“Guess not, yeah,” is how Liam responds, Harry not having much time to mentally register the passiveness of his answer upon stepping into what is the entrance hall of a rather…spacious house. Which only brings Harry to remember that the place had seemed quite extravagant from outside on the journey up to the front door. Which brings Harry to remember that this is where Liam _lives_ , and—how the fuck does the boy live here?

It’s also loud, with changing, colorful lights on as Harry finds himself stood amongst a littering of silhouettes of people who loosely hold drinks in their hands and fight to scream words into each other’s ears over the constant thrumming of the music. Only faintly next to him can Harry hear the sounds of Niall inquiring about the whereabouts of Zayn (more like “so where’s Zayn…and the soccer guys….and like, Zayn, and the rest of them”) right after Liam has finished thanking him for tutoring him through his final exams.

Harry’s whipping his head towards them, very much ready to attack Niall, because the boy had literally turned Harry away when he’d wanted tutoring for his final exams—apparently Harry tricks the boy into doing his work for him and gets “too easily distracted” but that isn’t the _point_ , the _point_ is, he chose Liam over him, and that’s not what a temporary back up best friend does.

Harry doesn’t get to land his hand on the boy’s shoulder for the very aggressive tap he was about to give him, however, because the loud, drawn out sound of his own name, layered just above the general loud music, is heard. It catches Harry’s attention and brings him to whip his eyes toward the sound.

“Oh my god, it’s _Harry_!” Louis says with just a bit of a slur, tugging on the arm of some guy that’s next to him, a guy that’s in one of Harry’s classes who’s just one of the many other people Louis is friends with that Harry doesn’t care to get to know.

Harry’s feet are already moving towards the boy, just because the boy having to raise his voice is starting to attract a few people’s amused attention (as well as Liam and Niall who have stopped conversing and have now just got blank, blinking eyes directed at Louis) and he really does not know how much the boy has had to drink, thus leading him not to know how loud he’s willing to scream.

“Louis…hi, um—“

“You’re wearing your _glasses_ ,” Louis begins, reaching to hold onto one of the tall plants set up near a corner wall of the house, right where the entrance turns into one of the many hallways. He has quite a diverse group accumulated near him, all who sit on or lean near a couch to the left of him, or sip at drinks as they stand around and chuckle about how clearly drunk Louis is. 

Louis obviously has probably had something quite unique to drink tonight, because the boy is honestly and fully _smiling_ right now, both rows of teeth and all, as he suddenly shakes one of his friends at the shoulders and tells them how Harry now looks just like he did for a few weeks in ninth grade, and also letting everyone know that Harry used to wear braces too. He has a bottle loose and hanging in one hand that’s definitely intended for people to share between themselves, but Harry’s willing to bet money that’s the opposite of what Louis’ done with the contents of it.

Harry’s a bit flushed as he pulls at his own collar a bit, laughing halfheartedly as a few eyes are now observing him and everyone’s mouths are loose and giggly. “Um—let’s not…we don’t have to remind everyone of my awkward freshman days, okay? And where have you—“

Louis’ stepping toward him quite briskly, grabbing a hold of one of Harry’s wrists with the hand that isn’t still grasping onto an almost empty bottle of liquor. “ _Shhhh. Shhhh.”_

Harry’s almost cross-eyed as Louis is bringing himself much too close to him, a dark purple shadow of his eyelashes cascading over his cheekbones, the boy himself struggling between continuing to uselessly shush him and giggle with loose, shiny lips.

“What—“

“I have to show you something,” Louis says, probably intending for it to be quiet and private, although almost everyone who’s relatively near can hear the inviting, hushed way he says it, which brings Harry to swallow once again as he glances around him and starts to feel nervy of what the fuck is happening right now.

“Show me…?” Harry breathes, confused and holding eye contact with Louis despite the boy looking immensely out of character right now as he alternates between piercing his eyes into Harry’s and flicking his gaze down to his lips.

“Yeah…yeah,” Louis begins, already pushing himself upright and starting down one of the halls, pulling Harry right along with him. “Show you something, in—in one of the rooms—“

“Oh _oh,_ yeah,” Harry chimes in, his voice slightly raised so as to save the boy in any way he can, since he is literally _exposing_ himself right now without a care. “That—that uh, final exam project _thing_ you and Liam worked on, you had to show me, in the…in the room.”

He knows it’s a weak attempt at getting everyone not to think anything of what’s going on right now, especially since they still have the eyes of all the nosy people pointed at them as they make their way to a different, more secluded area of a house that Louis clearly knows well. It’s just that…Harry doesn’t know how out Louis wants to be about all of…this. He doesn’t know if he even wants to be _out_ with it at all—he’s _drunk_ right now, for goodness’ sake. Literally the last thing the boy needs is to wake up in the morning and have everyone gossiping about him and that loser Harry.

Before they turn a corner of the house where they’ll certainly be out of view of everyone, Harry makes one last attempt to look over his shoulder for the eyes of _anyone_ , anyone at all as the boy just tugs him along. When his gaze finds the dimly blue-shaded and distant face of Niall, Liam still next to him as they seemed to have watched the whole weird thing go down, he mouths a useless _help me_ before he’s nearly stumbling over his feet with the pull Louis has on his wrist and vanishing out of view.

It seems currently, however, Louis’ fuzzy state is allowing him to care less about what the fuck people could be thinking of him right now as he finally pulls Harry into a bedroom of some sort, which is _far_ from where most of the party shenanigans are going on, and significantly more silent.

Harry has never heard the boy giggle this much. Usually when Louis is entertained or amused by something, he lets it show in the form of a one-sided smirk that’s barely there, or a simple, short hum that emerges from behind his closed lips.

But now, _now_ his stupid drunken childlike giggles are all Harry can hear as he’s stepping inside this bedroom that he’s pretty sure Liam most _definitely_ does not want him to be in, taking a moment to gaze at the dim lights everywhere inside of it and noticing the way the heavy, intricately designed duvet pairs with the similarly colored violet rug in the midst of the wooden floor. Harry certainly guesses this is a guest room, what with how empty and polished everything is.

Upon hearing the door close behind him, Harry turns around from observing the contents of the room, instead directing his eyes to the boy and remembering why they’re here. “What’d you have to show m—“

A demanding kiss from Louis is what knocks the sentence right out of Harry’s mouth as he finds himself already being pushed backwards and right into the dark wooden dresser that stands against the edge of the room, and he hears it knock against the wall as Louis grips both fists in the collar of his light jacket.

“Woah— _woah_ ,” is all Harry manages to get out in between the moments where their lips are attached, Harry now finding himself easily able to taste the bitterness of the alcohol that still resides on Louis’ tongue. He takes the immediate next break in the attachment of their lips to inch out of the way, all while Louis is reaching for the material of his jacket and keeping him close so he can giggle against his lips.

“Louis,” Harry breathes, finding himself already pulled back in by Louis’ hand cupping around the back of his neck, the both of them now having switched to a position where Louis is pressed against the dresser rather than Harry.

Louis brings him in by his neck close enough for their foreheads to bump, Harry feeling way past discombobulated as Louis’ intense gaze keeps itself solely on Harry’s lips, right before he’s closing the space between them once again and hiking a leg up around Harry’s hip.

Harry hears the dresser knock into the wall again, this time accompanied by the sound of what seems like the digital clock falling off of it, probably due to the way they keep shoving themselves against it or maybe Louis’ knocking it over now that he’s trying to get his balance against the dresser and is literally half grinding on Harry with the one leg he has drawn up against his hips.

Harry finds himself gripping onto Louis at the shoulders the best way he can, jerking the boy back and away from him, which only brings the boy to continue to make grabby hands at him.

“ _Louis_ ,” Harry begins again, finding it just a bit easier to breathe when Louis’ raised leg is slowly coming down. “We both know this doesn’t make any sense right now.”

“And why is that?” Louis asks, the permanent grin still on his face as he grips Harry at the center of his shirt and sort of mirrors him. 

Louis’ overt drunkenness and clumsy nature apparently makes him much more aggressive and strong, oddly, because Harry finds himself stumbling backwards on his feet once Louis is pushing him forward with the grip he has on his chest, the boy just about falling into his lap once he gets Harry to fall right into the small couch that’s been decorated against the edge of the room. 

Harry’s mind is on panic mode right about now—it’s much more focused on setting off alarms and anxiety rather than conjuring up words and sentences that come together to make sense, especially now that Louis’ fully in his lap, looking down on him and tracing a hand through his hair embracingly.

“Be-because,” Harry begins, the shuddering of his breath evident and his hands at his sides, not knowing what to do with themselves. “We just can’t—“

“Let’s just, let’s just go _crazy_ ,” Louis begins, voice significantly loud as he grips Harry’s strands and swings the boy’s head around at the word “crazy”. “Let’s go _crazy_ on each other. Like, just once. Let’s just go at it.”

Although Harry is very rational in the head right now and fully on board with how his brain knows this isn’t a good idea, he hates the rush of heat that makes a beeline for his pants, right where Louis happens to be sitting comfortably.

“I don’t…” Harry begins, taking a moment to breathe through his nostrils as Louis continues to muss up his hair and gaze at him with unprecedented desire. “I don’t, I—“

“You don’t what?” Louis whispers between them, his head moving with every inch that Harry tries to shake his head out of Louis’ way.

When Harry can’t conjure up the steady enough breath to actually say anything, Louis takes that as his sign to press his lips against Harry’s again, his tongue getting into the boy’s mouth just a hair of a second before their lips touch.

He’d kind of sent a distress signal to Niall before he’d gotten pulled here. Where _is_ that boy already? He’s probably doing the _much_ more important thing of making small talk with Zayn, using the Wikipedia searches he’s recently done on the history of soccer to woo him.

Harry intently keeps his hands at his sides throughout this intense (and quite steamy) make out session that he _definitely_ tries to put an end to, the boy’s hands roaming over his face and fondling his cheeks and exploring his hair as though he’s never going to have him again.

Louis caressing the boy’s cheeks between his two hands (as much as he can whilst still holding the neck of a liquor bottle in one hand) and breathing his hot words in between them is what gives Harry an opening. “God, you’re so sexy with the glasses,” he begins, breathing hotly as he moves a thumb to touch at Harry’s lips. “I always used to think that.”

Harry doesn’t say anything, instead letting his eyes open as his chest continues to cave and expand with a mixture of intense arousal and disbelief, all while he keeps his hands at his sides defiantly and curls his fingers in and out.

“Can we talk please,” Harry breathes, figuring now that he’s let Louis have his kiss and they’re both speaking quietly and calmly, that this will get him to cooperate better.

Harry receives the exact opposite of that, however, when Louis’ hand that had originally been caressing his cheek and thumbing at his lip moves slowly, ghosting down his chin and taking its place at the front of Harry’s throat to grip right around the top of his neck. He just holds it there, not exerting pressure of any sort, but surely displaying his intent as he keeps his dark gaze deadlocked on Harry’s. 

“ _Louis_ ,” Harry breathes, the word significantly shaky as he tries to will down the boner growing in his pants.

“You like that, don’t you?” Louis asks once he’s leaned forward enough to get the hushed question into Harry’s ear, uttering it at the same time as he barely grinds down against Harry’s growing bulge.

“Fuck yeah,” Harry says without thinking, not even realizing how his eyes have rolled back behind his closed eyelids, immersed under the spell of Louis gripping his neck a little tighter and grinding down on him with much more purpose. Harry recalls a few times in the past where he half-jokingly mentioned how he's slightly into the whole choking thing, Louis having almost always immediately told him to shut up about it before he could get too descriptive and "vomit-inducing", so the fact that the boy is actually _remembering_ it in this moment and using it to _cater_ to him—

It’s when Harry’s limp hands are budging and coming up to meet Louis’ hips that he snaps out of it once again, now very much eager to end this by all means necessary, since this is probably something that could put their friendship in a coffin by the morning.

“Wait no— _no_ ,” Harry says, struggling to make his voice strong as he now shoves away the hand Louis has around his neck. He moves his head so that he and Louis’ eyes can come back to meet, making his gaze hard and stern so that the boy can listen to him properly. “Where the fuck have you _been_?”

All Louis does is snort as though this question has finally broken him just a bit, now disregarding Harry’s demanding gaze as he sits up and brings the bottle up to his lips for a sip.

Harry continues speaking hysterically however, because there’s literally no other noise and the boy can definitely hear him. “I mean—you didn’t go to fucking _graduation_. _Graduation_ , Louis.”

All Louis does is giggle into his sleeve that he’d been using to wipe off his mouth, nearly doubling over as he remains in Harry’s lap and shakes himself into oblivion.

“Louis, I’m being serious,” Harry barks, raising his eyebrows and bringing his voice to a much louder level, before gripping the boy up under his chin and viciously bringing their eyes to meet. “Do you wanna talk, or something?”

Louis’ like a graceless animal when he smacks Harry’s hand away from his chin, offering a few more liquid chuckles in the process as Harry’s face remains solid and his frustration with this human in front of him grows to an exponential level.

“C’mon, ‘s no reason for me to go to graduation ‘n you know that,” Louis begins, snorting a bit as he scratches at his nose with his free hand. “’s not like you’re exactly unfamiliar with my home situation. No family who even gives a shit.”

Harry stares off for a moment as he ponders it, softening just a bit but still feeling significantly left in the dark by the absence of Louis in the past several days. “Yeah, but—“

“Now let’s stop talking about the boring stuff,” Louis pretty much purrs, grasping at Harry’s shoulders again and eager to pull him back in.

“Absolutely not,” Harry grunts while in the process of shoving Louis off of him, only for the boy to bend backwards quite overdramatically, now hanging upside down off of the chair as he still remains in Harry’s lap. The boy is basically indistinguishable from silly putty right now as he sings a “ _whoops_ ” and has the crown of his head almost touching the floor.

“God, you’re a handful—“

“ _You’re_ a handful,” Louis retorts, just as he rapidly moves to sit back up and hits Harry square in the face with the bottle he’s holding in the process. It gets Harry right in the nose, alright. The bottom of a liquor bottle is quite painful, he’s come to learn.

“ _Ow_!” Harry exclaims, hand flying to his own nose as Louis’ shoulders begin to shake with his giggles again. “Fuck.”

“ _Sorryyyy_ ,” Louis sings, and even with the immense amount of pain Harry’s feeling in the center of his face right now as he creases his brows and holds his nose, a faint part of him is washed with relief once it seems the boy is shifting in order to get off of his lap.

And that relief is immediately replaced with fight or flight once again when all the boy does is set the bottle on the ground before pulling Harry up by both of his wrists and shoving him the few feet towards the bed.

Harry almost misses the bed, honestly, which would’ve resulted in a concussion of a special degree had Louis possessed any less coordination than he currently bears and Harry had hit his head on one of the thick wooden bed frame things.

_Still_ , however, Harry is suffering through an unfortunate series of events, especially now that he’s struggling to wrestle Louis off of him on top of a bed that wears sheets he can’t afford, Louis purring like an insatiable cat as he lazily tries his hand at securing a position on top of him. It’s safe to say the boy is disastrously horny.

Harry secures the upper hand not even for a _second_ —hands pinning the boy’s shoulders down, Louis being the horny evil that is defeated, all that good stuff—before the door to the room is being swung open, and it all seems to happen within seconds, the way Liam releases the door handle, stalks over, whips Harry around, and punches him dead in the face.

In a natural way after being punched in the face, Harry’s sent stumbling off of the bed, thankfully just barely catching himself from falling clean off of it, although he doesn’t know how he accomplishes that exactly. He doesn’t know anything, really, now that he’s had his nose bashed in twice, one coming not too long after the other. Don't even ask him where his glasses are.

“Fuck,” Harry mutters, both hands cupping his now bleeding nose and his vision hugely blurry as he sinks into the wall his back had thumped against, close to buckling to the ground and wildly unsteady. “Haven’t been fag bashed since middle school.”

“Liam, Jesus,” Harry hears Louis breathe, causing him to open his eyes as much as he can muster, still rested back against one wall of the room and not feeling all of his senses again yet. 

Louis is sliding himself off of the bed, only having looked directly at Harry as he said it, and the boy looks almost…devastated. Disbelieving. Two moods that Harry rarely ever sees on him.

“He was _throwing_ himself at you!” Liam yells, nostrils flared as he gestures sharply at Harry, eyes focused fiercely on Louis as Louis’ eyes are focused fiercely on the blood that now trails down the hand that Harry is still holding against his nose.

“I was…” Louis begins, his in and out breaths copious as his eyes move away from Harry, the boy clearly lost in this situation, in how fast the events escalated. “I was, um …”

“What?” Liam says, growing agitated as he stands up straighter, clenching his jaw for half a second before continuing. “ _What,_ Louis? Don’t defend him. He was literally on top of you—“

“I was throwing myself at _him_!” Louis shouts, the ear-splitting volume of it making Harry wince a bit, Louis’ eyes bloodshot and distressed. “It was fucking me.”

And then he’s moving to hastily exit the room, violently shoving Liam’s shoulder on the way past and definitely not sober enough not to bump into the doorframe on the way out.

Harry and Liam are just left there to stand, the cloud of thick tension Louis has left behind just lingering in the air between them, although it seems Liam is more preoccupied with his own thoughts and silent realizations as the balled up fists at his sides let themselves loose, his eyes not even acknowledging Harry in the slightest.

“Well,” Harry begins, still holding his nose in order to catch any of the blood that runs out and forcing a grin (that sort of hurts). “This is awkward.”

Liam still doesn’t spare him a glance before shaking his head and moving to leave, just as dramatically and hastily as Louis as he leaves Harry to his own company and possibly sprained nose.

Harry makes use of himself by utilizing the bathroom in this room to rinse his nose out thoroughly and bundle up a bunch of napkins to keep everything from leaking, since it’s clear the least of Liam’s worries relate to the fact that Harry is in one of the bedrooms of his house right now.

And after that, after Harry has roamed the house holding a wad of napkins to his nose and looking for his best friend, he magically stumbles across him, still far away from most of the party noise and by one of the quiet, dark hallway columns, chokingly sobbing and sniffling around a new bottle.

Harry guesses today is a crying day for both of them, obviously.

Harry doesn’t make it a big deal, doesn’t acknowledge to the boy that he’s crying as he usually would in order to use this against him as soon as possible. He just joins him in the dark, gently pries the bottle out between his palms, and guides him to the nearest bathroom in order to help him throw up. Better here than at his mother’s house, anyway.

By the time the deep night falls, Harry has already driven them home, glad not to have his mother up and witnessing their arrival at 1 a.m., since he’d told her he was going to a party anyway and that she didn’t have to wait up for him.

The bleeding has fully stopped from his nose by now, although the item on his face is still sensitive to the touch. Also, by now, Louis hasn’t even said any real words; not during the round of hurling into Liam’s toilet while Harry patted at his back, not on the drive here, and not right now, even as Harry gets blankets over the boy’s body upon his bed and works his thumb through his hair. He’s too drunk; all he’s been able to offer are unintelligible mumbles.

Harry only rinses his nose out once more in the bathroom before changing himself into some comfortable nighttime clothes and sliding himself into bed with the boy, reaching over on his nightstand in order to get everything endlessly dark.

In the morning, what wakes Harry up is the shifting of his bed, which is something he usually expects when Louis sleeps with him at this point. The boy cannot stay still to save his life.

Harry tries not to react to it, however, instead curling his arm up under the pillow he has his head rested against and attempting to squeeze as much additional sleep as he can out of this morning. Behind his closed eyes he can already tell that everything’s too fucking bright to bear, and he’s not ready to face it just yet.

But it seems when Louis continues to shift around, followed by a mumble of the words “’m leaving”, Harry’s eyes are open and moving, as though he hadn’t even been just another few snuggles against his pillow from falling asleep again.

Harry’s running his hand through his own messy hair now, tremendously tired and wishing Louis would just sleep the day away with him so that he doesn’t have to deal with this now.

“Already?” Harry asks, groggy and mumbled into his pillow, facing the opposite direction of the boy behind him who is presumably pushing himself out of the bed.

“Mhm,” is how Louis responds, Harry feeling the complete removal of the boy from the bed as the mattress lifts, Harry assuming he’s now slipping on his shoes.

Harry can’t help but to turn over now, still very disoriented from how deep his sleep was and unable to pull his eyes open to anything other than baggy slits. Half of his face is burrowed in the thick peach blanket, and his hair teases at his own mouth whilst he speaks.

“Can we talk,” he asks monotonously, figuring the morning indifference has pushed him to just rip the band-aid off.

Louis pauses, hoodie that he’d been wearing last night folded over his arm, and his other hand lazily searching through the notifications on his phone.

“Sure,” Louis replies without care, eyes still not meeting Harry. “Blah. Blah blah. Blah. There.”

And then he’s reaching into an old bag of skittles on Harry’s desk, popping one into his mouth, and preparing to exit the room without even a trickle of concern. “Thanks for last night, I guess. I don’t remember anything.”

This is what brings Harry to sit up, the sleepiness dwindling within him with every step the boy takes closer to exiting his room. He’s speaking up just as the boy is touching the doorknob, and he’s a bit surprised to find his voice so demanding, and awake, and serious the way it comes out.

“Liam punched me,” Harry says, blunt and shrill. “In the _face_.”

Louis goes still where he’s gripping the edge of the somewhat open door, and it’s easy to notice the way his shoulders droop just a bit, as though he’d definitely felt something in response to that. Maybe it’s softened him. Maybe it’s taken him aback. Does he genuinely not remember that happening?

“I’ll tell him not to do it anymore,” Louis says over his shoulder, still not having fully looked at Harry this morning as he pulls the door open, but _not_ before Harry can continue to drill him, however.

“ _Or_ you could stop being a fucking imbecile and having one of your best friends be a flaming gay,” Harry begins, gesturing chaotically at himself even though Louis isn’t staring at him. “And the other one, a raging homophobe.”

Harry’s mini rant hasn’t even finished before Louis’ scrunching a hand in his hair, stressed and showing that Harry is irritating him in irreversible ways. “Can we—“ Louis begins, groaning halfheartedly as he pulls at his hair again. “Can we just not fucking do this. Right now. Like, please.”

Harry’s hands drop into his lap, not even knowing why he feels so defeated in this moment, realizing his best friend can’t even give _much_ of an enraged reaction to how he’d gotten punched in the fucking face last night.

“Why,” he says, voice hardly there as he now blinks down at his blankets, figuring they both obviously don’t need to make eye contact with each other right now.

“I have a headache, and I’m fucking hungover—I don’t feel like arguing,” Louis replies, voice now much lower as he hangs his head down, hand still gripping the door. “Sorry.” And then he’s actually departing, right out of the door, and leaving Harry with a crippling uncertainty, caused by the one person he’s always been most certain about.

And it doesn’t even feel remotely normal to him to offer one of his routine, reassuring “love you”’s, even though this is probably a time where they both need to hear it most.


	6. Chapter 6

Louis can’t make out how long he’s been sat by his bedroom window, reclined upon the comfortable sill of it with his headphones surrounding his head nicely, watching the fluffed shapes of the clouds change in the sky as the day ages on. Time is never something he really acknowledges when he doesn’t have to, which is precisely the case now that he has fully wiped his hands of all academic responsibilities related to high school.

He has simply sat here silently, taking the time to be with himself and let his surroundings continue to the sound of gentle piano keys and lulling violin strings.

It’s quite cool, Louis thinks, that people are aware that he’s very fond of his headphones, and especially fond of having them on everywhere that he can (his school absolutely sucked for confiscating them every time he tried to pull them out on school grounds), yet no one knows the particular type of music he always plays. Don’t get him wrong, he likes a lot of genres, and there are a few current artists that spark his interest just a bit when he gets around to discovering, but most of the time, he just wants something that can keep him sedated.

It’s Sunday, and Louis has nothing to do, which is really pleasant.

And it’s why he’s sat here against his window, grateful of the view outside of it that’s always been one of the few parts of this house that he doesn’t despise, and he has his graduation cap in his hands as he absentmindedly plucks and pulls away at the stringy things that are attached to it.

When he’d come into his room this morning and seen the clear package evidently having been thrown on his floor and left there for him to find, complete with his graduation gown, cap, and class stone or something, he figured this was the best way to make use of it, as well as keep his bored hands busy.

Obviously, the school had found a way to get it to him since Louis clearly wasn’t going to go out of his way to retrieve the graduation items himself. He wonders if they’ll do the same for his diploma too.

It’s all just starting to settle in now, though. Feel a bit more real.

He’s a first generation high school graduate. Whether he walked across the stage or not, he has that title. They’ll still make sure his diploma gets to him. And that’s…something, really. A good something, according to the many school assemblies and college informational packets.

He forgets that his phone even exists as an actual thing until the vibration of it is felt where he has his leg stretched out in front of him upon the window sill.

He reaches for where it sits behind his hips, figuring now would be a better time than ever to silence it.

He only briefly gets a glimpse at the fact that it’s Harry who’s texted him as he’s navigating his screen in order to completely silence his phone, and he doesn’t really react to it, nor move to actually read the content of the message, before tossing his phone across the room and upon the cushiony surface of his bed.

He moves to rest his head back against the wall, feeling an approaching state of peace as he closes his eyes gently. The clouds will still be there. He can open his eyes any time to watch them again, and they’ll still be there.

Louis doesn’t know if he falls into a light sleep, he doesn’t know how long he remains with his eyes closed, he doesn’t know if the song playing in his ears has switched to another. All he knows is at some point, the booming sound of his bedroom door opening and slamming into the wall behind it is very much loud enough to knock him out of whatever trance he’d been in.

Louis’ shoulders are jumping up reactively as he’s quickly sliding his headphones off of his ears in the same instant, not surprised to find his father standing at his doorway, bruised, scabbed knuckles tightly gripping the doorknob, gray work overalls on, and the usual cigarette in its regular home behind his left ear.

“I’ve been calling you for ages now,” his father says, an annoyed edge to his tone as Louis now takes notice of a few envelopes in the hand that remains by his side. “Are you _deaf?”_

“Sorry,” Louis replies without emotion, his father tossing the mail upon the nearest table without care.

“Don’t let it happen again,” he says with a scowl, already getting ready to leave right back out of the room, but quickly changing his mind in order to hold it open just a little longer. “And it’s about time you went and found a job. You know, make yourself useful. This isn’t a fucking motel.”

Louis’ eyes are more occupied with concentrating on the strings he’s now gone back to plucking out of his grad cap, halfheartedly replying to his father without giving him much undivided attention. “Got it.”

“Louis,” comes his voice again, the man staying put in his doorway and sounding just a bit more determinedly grim. “Look at me.”

Although it takes a while as Louis uses his sweet time, his eyes wander up and towards his father, both of them on opposite sides of the room, several feet in between them and several miles of emotional drywall as well.

“I’m not fucking around. I’m serious,” he continues. “I know your hip friends and useless school shrinks probably convince you to hate me or whatever, but I’m the one that fucking _provides_ for your ass. It wouldn’t kill you to lend a hand.”

Louis nods once, just sincerely wanting this exchange to end within the next five seconds. “I know.”

Judging by the continued perturbed air in his father’s eyes, paired with the way he’s still gripping relentlessly onto the doorknob, he doesn’t believe Louis “knows” like he claims to, but still leaves out of his room with an unintelligible angry grumble, letting the door slam behind him.

Louis lets out the heavy, tired breath he’d been holding in once the door is closed, gaze falling down upon his graduation cap and his mind not exactly sure about what to think at the current moment.

He keeps his headphones out of his ears after that, just listening somewhat in order to make sure of when his father leaves for work and he’ll have the place to himself. The sound of the man leaving through the front door and starting up his truck is heard after only about half an hour, bringing Louis’ body to ease just that much more, almost involuntarily whilst he listens to it.

He makes use of himself by wandering downstairs, just to see if by any chance, more food has appeared in the fridge. Miraculously, of course, because it’d be quite the miracle if it were to happen as a result of Louis’ _dad_ going out and _buying_ groceries. That’d have to be black magic.

Fittingly, it proves itself to be impossible, finding magical food in the fridge that doesn’t consist of beer and leftovers that he’s not allowed to touch and water bottles and just a few molded fruits toward the very back that need to be cleaned out.

Louis guesses it wouldn’t hurt to take a walk, or something. Maybe he’ll stumble upon some place to grab a bite hopefully.

He has his headphones around his neck and his hands placed deep in the pockets of his jersey pants as he walks along the sidewalk, having long ago decided that he actually really likes the simplistic sound of outside, the distant birds, faraway cars, whistling winds, even more so than his music sometimes.

Even though the day isn’t over yet, Louis regards this as a very successful, tranquil Sunday. Definitely a significantly lesser abundance of yelling and friction and back-and-forth matches than usual on any day where Louis has absolutely nowhere to be outside of home, so he takes this as an achievement.

He checks his phone for probably the first time in three hours as he walks, solely with the intent to check how many steps he’s taken today and make a super short-term goal for number of steps by the end of the day, but he’s quickly sidetracked by the fact that he continues to receive back to back texts.

All from Harry.

It shows that there are fifteen unread ones, but the only ones Louis sees are the new ones that are currently flashing across his screen right now as they come in.

**Harry:** _answer_

**Harry:** _me_

**Harry:** _please_

**Harry:** _like what the fuck???_

The presence of these messages doesn’t put a pause or a stammer in any of Louis’ steps as he continues forth on the sidewalk, and they also don’t amuse or move him in the least bit as he remains indifferent at the face.

**Harry:** _let me know ur alive_

**Harry:** _at least_

Louis just continues his walk, not really knowing still if he wants to reply, because if he’s being completely honest and unfiltered, he just doesn’t want to. He doesn’t feel like talking to the boy right now.

The next text, however, is what seems to make the decision for him, Louis’ jaw tightening in reaction to it.

**Harry:** _or i’ll tell my mom ur missing. i’m being for real_

This is what brings Louis’ feet side by side, the boy stopped where he is and thoroughly annoyed, even though he guesses Harry’s worrying is valid, since he’s been texting him since yesterday morning.

Louis settles on sending him nothing other than a period, because he feels it suffices enough. All he’d wanted was to confirm the boy was alive, right?

He doesn’t even wait around for anything else as he pockets his phone again, continuing his stride and guessing his super short-term goal of achieving a certain amount of steps might just have to wait for another day, since it’s clear he can’t look at his phone without being bombarded.

There’s a bar nearby that Louis’ always admired. It’s right where the neighborhood ends, and it’s pretty trifling, with subpar service, and creepy people, and sticky counters. It’s amazing.

Louis’ always admired it because it’s often what his father comes home smelling like, which may seem backwards, but still. Louis has grown accustomed to just the general smell of the bar—more particularly, the way it wafts over him when he walks past it upon the sidewalk.

It’s almost an hour of a walk before Louis has to reach it, and he happily takes that walk—not with the specific intent to stride past it, but just because that’s where his walk happened to take him. He’s walked this route a bunch of times by now, along with many other different ones. He’s lucky he hasn’t gotten snatched up by now.

Today, however, he decides to switch it up. Try his hand at actually entering the bar. The sun hasn’t even begun its descent for the day yet, so he knows without a doubt that it may be especially uncomfortable in energy in there right now.

It’s not like it’s a huge risk and a leap of faith or whatever, because all Louis does is take his phone out and pull out the fake I.D. that he keeps inside of his phone case, right alongside his real I.D. and his credit card (living life on the edge, he knows), and he reaches for one of the door handles in order to swing it open.

The smell sort of encompasses him before he’s hardly even taken any steps in. It reminds him of so many things. So many frustrating days. Those very sweet memories of being picked up four hours late from school, way after every student has long been home.

Louis’ hoisting himself up onto one of the tall barstools at the counter before he can really plan it out, not feeling as though this should be made a big deal or anything. Freaking out and stalling and planning are things that only make a person look more suspicious for no reason. 

Exactly things Harry would do.

But since Louis is here by himself, in charge of himself, making decisions with himself, he doesn’t have to deal with any of that exhausting back and forth. All he has to do is flash his fake I.D. at the weirdly lanky bartender behind the counter and ask for whatever he wants.

Louis is starting to like drinking.

Well, he’s always sort of liked it moderately, but he acknowledges that as he’s growing older it’s becoming easier to access and consume, and he’s not an idiot; he also knows that this could hint at many future, or maybe even more immediate things. Not _problems_ , per say, but…things.

Maybe it runs in the family. Maybe it’s in his DNA, and why he’s so drawn to the murky scent of this place. No reason for him to run away from destiny.

Once he’s gotten his glass and has chugged a majority of it in one go, he moves to pull his phone out of his pocket just to make sure Harry hasn’t made any more threats to get the FBI involved since the last time they’d texted.

He finds nothing from Harry.

Only a text from Liam, asking if he wants to hang out with a few other boys at his place today. The usual. Liam’s place is huge.

Louis ignores it though, placing his phone face down upon the layer of ancient sticky beverage on the counter and deciding that’s not something he’s going to get into today.

With every refill of his drink, the bartender even inquiring about whether he’s driving or not and Louis telling him he walked here, Louis grows more immersed in how…with _himself_ he wants to be in this moment. He has a _blast_ with himself. In his own head. Making his own rules. Making his own fantasy lands. No immediate duties. It’s awesome.

Just himself. No Liam. No teammates. No Jas.

It’s simply the only thing that makes sense, because high school is over now. He has to get used to it, this whole being alone and on his own stuff. It’ll be a lot easier to face that reality if he eases himself into it, which is just a tad difficult now that his friends and former teammates want to hang out nearly every second of every day.

At this point in his life…this turning point, there are just a lot of things that he has to accept, and understand, as well as a lot of predicaments he simply can’t get _into_ right now—

Louis’ in the midst of his train of thought, head rested gently against his fist and other hand tracing through the fog on his glass due to the cold of the drink, when something in his peripheral and to his right garners just a bit of his interest.

It appears to be someone struggling with trying to get the clearly ancient and worthless music box to play, the person evidently having already put money into it, or something. It was the sound of his hand slapping against the machine that had procured Louis’ eyes to move in his direction, head still rested in his fist and slippery lips feeling quite warm right about now.

“That thing hasn’t worked in years,” the bartender decides to say now, even though he’s far too late. He’s lazily and barely wiping down one end of the counter with a filthy off-white rag as the guy turns to him, clearly ready to go ahead and attack him for not saying anything sooner.

But it appears his eyes catch sight of Louis before he can do that, however, finding the boy on the other side of the bartender just watching him, unabashedly and curiously, with no real discernible mood on his face.

The guy has on this cool retro jacket. One of those colorful, puffy ones that people find at thrift stores, which Louis’ tried so many times to search for without luck, and his hair’s pulled back into a messy bun, many strands of hair stray and about. He has enough _hair_ to pull into a bun.

Despite getting no real facial expression of interest from Louis, just straightforward blinking eyes, he flashes a crooked grin at the boy—one that’s not _too_ forward, indicating that he’ll leave Louis his space, but just forward _enough_ to show that he’s definitely interested and would totally be down if Louis would let the man invade his space.

Almost on an automatic switch, Louis’ lip just barely pulls upward at one side, Louis not even knowing if the man is able to see it from where he stands, but not really caring. He was pretty much grinning for the sake of himself, anyway.

He brings his eyes back down to the contents of his glass, definitely a fuzzier feeling settling all around him now as the drink continues to affect him in more ways than one.

Still though.

Not today.

He’ll just be with himself.

And that’s okay.

Or at least, he makes himself okay with it as he allows the alleviating effects of several more glasses to do its magic on him.

But before long, he finds that it may actually just be helping him to better confront his problems more than anything else.

At a certain point he’s spent a significant amount of time slumped over with his forehead rested upon the counter, his eyes watching his lap and the bartender probably debating on whether or not he should check if he’s alive.

Is he even alive? He’s not sure he can answer that question himself, really.

As much as Louis tries to keep his cool about things and vow to just move in whichever way life wants him to, he most certainly has his _moments_ where the reality of how crucial things can be starts to weigh him down, forcing him to think about it, to _stress_ about it. High school being over. Whether he should even try working towards college or not. If he’s just going to decide to get a job and thus put a lock on the fact that he’s going to live under his dad’s roof forever. They’re all very real, _soon_ -to-happen worries that Louis just doesn’t feel like getting worked up about. But like, life is _forcing_ him to.

And the one person he should be able to talk to about these kinds of troubles…he can’t.

He runs tense fingers back and through his hair as he keeps his forehead against the counter, the sticky surface of it only half felt by him as he remains dead there.

He’s always been able to talk to Harry about anything, and now it’s beginning to feel like that’s changed, and it doesn’t really take a lot for him to acknowledge that it’s all his fault. All he had to do was _not_ fuck his best friend, and things could’ve been perfectly fine right now, and he’d be able to perhaps voice some of his problems with the boy effortlessly. It seems that destiny for the two of them breaking up as friends, which was bound to happen in Louis’ eyes now that they’re going different ways, has come much earlier than expected. All because Louis couldn’t not fuck his friend.

He guesses it _is_ in his DNA, being a fuck up. He won’t sit around and mope about it, try to run from it; he’d already spent a good portion of his early teen years doing that, filled with determination for making something better of himself and flashing a finger at his dad, but he’s way past that. He’s just kind of grown to have an indifferent acceptance of it. He’s going to fuck up several times, and it’s something that’s predetermined for him given the circumstances he was born into. He can’t change this.

Louis’ blindly lifting the hand that was in his hair, his fingers searching around for where he’d set his phone face down on the counter, and it takes him quite a while to retrieve it, the boy already feeling as though he’ll probably fall right off of this stool if he even tries his hand at sitting up.

He keeps his heavy forehead where it is, half aware of the sounds of a group nearby him arriving at the counter and speaking over each other in order to request their drinks to the bartender, and he’s working his thumb over his phone screen in his lap, the device especially bright as Louis even finds himself squinting a bit within the tiny cave he’s made out of himself.

He’s not even sure of what he’s doing until he finds himself pressing the call button on Liam’s name, letting out a burp as he brings the device up to his ear and starting to feel that only drinking and eating nothing today will most likely have a negative effect on his poorly functioning stomach.

He’s not even sure of when Liam answers. He just assumes the boy has said hello and that he’d somehow missed it once his brain is registering the static movement of noise on the other end. He’s rubbing heavily at his eyes with his free hand, trying to conjure up what it is he wants to say.

“You…” Louis begins, knitting his brows and clearing up his throat a bit. “You can’t do that. You can’t do that, Liam.”

“What?” is how the boy responds, lost and confused, although in Louis’ mind, this feels like a very clear and detailed conversation, one that they’ve been having for a while now.

Louis moves to sit up, the dizzying sway of everything immediately bringing him to have to reach for the counter in order to steady himself, trying not to acknowledge the few moving eyes that glance over at him.

“You can’t do that anymore. To Harry,” Louis continues, pinching the bridge of his nose and letting his eyes fall shut, his back hunched over and his words mumbled close into the device. He doesn’t even have it against his ear in a way that he’d be able to hear if the boy is replying to him anymore, just making sure to get in what he needs to say himself. “Like, you know he’s important to me. He’s important to me ‘n you know that.”

He can faintly hear what Liam’s saying even as the phone is far from his ear, probably due to the fact that the boy may be raising his voice to say it, but the blunt accusation of “I know you’re drunk” isn’t hard to discern.

“Yeah, I am, so what?” Louis asks, growing a bit sterner as his shoulders rise with defense. “Fuck is your problem with him?” He actually brings the phone to his ear after his question, his muddled mind desperate to know the answer, whether his guesses are about to be confirmed or if he’s just going to be hit with a bunch of excuses. Louis’ never had a problem with Harry. He doesn’t think Harry has any flaws. So he really wants to know what it is Liam’s going to say.

“I just…” Liam begins, taking a moment to sigh. “I feel like you’ve changed so much now. Like…we’ve known each other since we were kids, man. Sometimes it’s like you’re a different person.”

Louis doesn’t reply, instead rubbing his nose exhaustedly and keeping his face rigid, bearing no idea of how to process this information, especially since it’s his first time hearing it.

“It’s like I don’t even know you anymore,” Liam continues, sounding much surer of himself, his voice with an aggressive edge. “And then this whole thing with that Harry guy—“

“ _Don’t_ , okay?” Louis spits, pointing a finger despite the boy not being in front of him. “ _No_. Don’t fucking blame him, alright? Don’t blame him for anything bad. The fucking off, and the drinking, and I guess the—the way I've changed, and the…weird stuff you walked in on—it’s all _me_ , okay. It’s fucking me, and I told you that.”

“Louis, I’m just _saying_ , it’s easy to be influenced by who you’re constantly around—“

“Oh, _bullshit_ ,” Louis sneers, his face even holding an expression of disgust.

“Okay,” Liam replies calmly, sounding dismissive of this conversation now. “We can have this talk at another time. Preferably where you’re not drunk.”

“Drunk, not drunk—listen to me closely, Liam,” Louis begins, shifting more comfortably into his seat since he’d begun sliding off, and positioning his phone in front of his mouth in that same way where he can’t possibly hear what’s on the other line. “You lay a finger on Harry again, you’re dead.” 

“ _What—_ “

“ _Fucking dead_ , _Liam Payne_ ,” Louis practically growls, his nostrils flared and his body harboring a contained boundless rage that he doesn’t even know where to store, and he doesn’t even wait around for anything else before pressing to end the call, feeling like a shaking ball of budding fire as even the slight memory of Harry getting punched across the face that night begins to drill at his skull like a bulldozer.

Yeah, Liam’s his best friend (supposedly). Yeah, he just threatened to literally kill him. The thing is, Harry is his best friend too, and some things have to be weighed out in order of importance. Louis has to establish himself on a side. He’s never been one to just roll with the popularity of things and not stand up for those who need it. It may take him a while, but he always eventually does.

Louis slaps a hand against his glass in order to send it gliding across the counter and away from him, and he’s making a move to slide himself down from his stool (which ends up being quite a reckless and unbalanced maneuver), sloppily grabbing his phone from off the floor after dropping it hastily, and calling it a night. Or evening. He doesn’t really think it’s even gotten dark yet.

This was a fun time, though.

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

He can officially say this is the last time he’ll ever have to enter this building.

He’d actually _thought_ that was the case before, when he’d made his own decision to stop coming to school and thought the diploma would just get mailed to him like the rest of his things, but no, he has to pick it up, which is why he now finds himself pushing through the exit doors to the school, folder in tow that contains the useless piece of paper that’s supposed to make him feel like he’s achieved something.

The summer programs and night classes at the school are in full effect right now, so Louis had of course made it his duty to procrastinate as much as possible in picking up his diploma from the office, which is why he’s currently trotting down the school front steps well into the early night, feeling a sort of quiet coolness about the fact that he’s even on school grounds when everything’s so dark.

It’s actually quite pleasing to admire the continuous energy of the school as opposed to having it empty and dull, Louis taking notice of miserable summer school students still getting dropped off at the curb, the uniformed workers currently tending to some new renovations near the school front garden that appear to be coming along nicely—

And Harry.

There he is, of all places on this lovely night, oblivious to the fact that Louis is even nearby as he’s struggling with his bike on the sidewalk near the street corner of the school, trying to get it upright, presumably in order to bike wherever he intends to go. Louis rolls his eyes at the sight of it, because it’s pretty much only a silhouette of the boy and his bike from Louis’ point of view, but he’s still clearly able to know it’s him, what with the way he grunts “stupid thing” into the air and fly away curls frame his shadow.

Louis’ feet are walking towards the boy before he can even really think about it, Louis already feeling this silent amount of sorrow for the fact that Harry’s evidently dealing with one of those unlucky days where his car refuses to start up. 

Harry notices Louis’ approach at probably the last possible moment, Louis guessing it’s either because his footsteps are feather light, the boy is hazardously unaware of his surroundings, or he hadn’t been caring about whoever it was that’d been approaching him so closely.

When the boy’s eyes move in his direction, his hands braced on the bike handles although his body still stands alongside it, his light cargo jacket moving lightly with the nighttime wind, and his eyes void of the eyeglasses that had made a quick and fleeting appearance, Louis pauses in his steps, eyes direct and blinking. The boy is sporting a pretty visible and striking dark cut across the bridge of his nose, and it’s oddly interesting to the eye if Louis’ being honest, makes him look like he has some mysterious back story to him. 

He’s definitely wondering why Harry’s here right now, and Harry’s probably wondering why Louis’ here right now, as well as why he’d gone mute on him these past few days, but Louis’ very good at getting to the main point of why he’s approached him and dealing with the other small talk later.

“Put your stupid bike in my trunk,” Louis practically sighs, already turning around and starting in the direction he’d parked, not bearing the patience for Harry’s wide, cartoon eyes and completely closed mouth.

So they end up in Louis’ car, Harry in the passenger seat, his bike occasionally making a faint rattle in the trunk, and the radio just a little too low in volume to mask the fact that they aren’t speaking. The only communication they’ve had is a brief exchange on the fact that Harry’d been on the way home, and that that’s where they are to be headed right now. Louis doesn’t make a move to raise the volume though; he likes to challenge himself through the tension a bit.

“Why were you there so late?” Harry finally asks at some point, ten minutes into the ride. He has his fingers tapping against his lap and he sufficiently looks like a stranger in Louis’ car.

“Diploma,” Louis replies, both hands rested in his lap as he lets the straightness of the road carry them along. “You?”

Harry seems happy to answer at first, Louis quirking an eyebrow up in anticipation of his response. “Oh, I was—wait, you don’t even give a shit,” Harry says, quickly dimming in enthusiasm as his sentence progresses, one of his elbows moving to lean against the window in defiance. “So no idea why you deserve to know.”

Louis purses his lips at himself, nodding his head slowly and not _completely_ thrown off by that answer. He kind of deserves it for how unresponsive he’s been.

Still, he chooses to respond in the natural Louis Way, not eager to show anyone that anything has gotten to him. “Okay, fine, don’t tell me,” Louis shrugs, lifting one shoulder. “I won’t throw a bitch fit.”

More silence follows, although it can’t be classified as awkward. It’s more like…hostile, actually, Harry’s head rested against his fist as he stays leaned away from Louis, and Louis parading his uncaring aura and pretending what he’s having for dinner is more of a concern to him than whether they speak or not.

But it doesn’t take long for him to break the façade, however, because Harry just…really isn’t speaking. Which is always a dangerous sign considering how much the boy loves to constantly be moving his mouth. It’s like he’s being stubborn, really, as though he’s actually irritated at Louis and doesn’t plan on warming back up to him anytime soon, which is something that is not very cool, in Louis’ book.

“I talked to Liam,” Louis tries, annoyingly and loudly sucking on his teeth once he’s slowing down in Harry’s neighborhood, not very far from his house now. “Told him that wasn’t okay.”

“Wow,” Harry replies tonelessly, eyes still out of the window as Louis pulls up on the curb to his house. “Thank you for doing the bare minimum.”

“Hey,” Louis sighs, a bit of a plead to his tone as the car is now still and he drifts his gaze towards the boy, head still rested back nicely against the seat. “Harry. Don’t be like that.”

“Be like _what_?” the boy asks, now facing Louis and turning the dramatic switch right on. He’s gesturing wildly as he speaks, most of the rant being purely for himself as Louis listens in on it and watches him. “You skip school, you skip graduation, I don’t hear _anything_ from you—then you’re fucking trying to jump my bones at some party, your friend punches me in the nose, and then you fucking go silent on me again.” He picks his phone up off of his lap frantically, thrusting it in Louis’ face in time with his words. “ _Twenty, texts, Louis!_ Twenty _fucking_ texts before you responded to me, your ‘best friend’ allegedly.” He makes a point to do air quotes with his free hand, Louis not really being able to help the way his lips begin to curve crookedly in response to it.

He doesn’t even know why he’s now stifling a soft, gentle laugh as best as he can right now, head still blissfully rested against the seat and eyes focused on the nearly dark outlines of the frazzled boy in front of him. It’s not _funny_ per say, watching him freak out like this, but it’s sort of…amusingly endearing. That’s the best way to describe it. If he could hold his laugh in this moment he absolutely would, especially with the way Harry is now glaring at him and puffing almost disbelievingly, but he just can’t.

Harry’s always been endearing. And it’s rare for Louis to ever be able to endure someone’s complaints and whines and tangents with fond eyes and a hidden smile, but Louis finds himself doing that, on more occasions than one.

He doesn’t know why he’s so unsure about this boy sometimes. He really doesn’t. It should be as clear as day.

“What?” Harry asks, tone breathy as he seems to come down from his rant, trying to grasp what’s funny.

“Harry, Harry,” Louis answers, not even sure what he’s getting at as sound barely comes out of his mouth when he says it. Maybe he’s just trying to settle the both of them down, bring things to a more quieter, silenced atmosphere within this tiny vacuum of a car.

And it seems it works, because not before long, Harry’s settling into his seat a bit, a gradual look of blank confusion upon his face as he holds eyes with Louis and silently voices the question again. “What?”

Louis shifts where he sits just a bit, placing his elbow upon the low barrier between them and tilting his head at the boy, eyes observant of the red, dried cut crooked upon the bridge of his nose again. “You can’t just walk around with a bruised face like that,” Louis begins thoughtfully. “It’s gonna get infected.” He makes a point of leaning forth and gently poking at it, immediately bringing Harry to flinch in response (he’s being dramatic) and hold his hands over it.

“Ow,” Harry replies, all but convincing as his voice is muffled through his hands. “Do you wanna lose that finger?”

“Shut up already,” Louis mumbles as he’s stretching across Harry and reaching for the opening to the glove compartment. He rummages through it a bit, Harry quieting next to him as Louis is making a search for the band-aids he hopes he still has in there for convenience.

Once he finds the small pack, he’s pulling one strip out from the rest, taking notice of how quiet and inquisitive Harry’s gone.

Harry’s lifting a hesitant hand in order to take the band-aid from him that he assumed Louis was just going to allow him to put on himself, but Louis dismisses it as he sits forward and positioned toward the boy on his side, working to separate the sticky layer off of the band-aid and watching as Harry’s hand lowers with reluctance, silent, innocent realization taking its place on his face.

Louis’ car exists somewhere outside of the normal realm as both he and Harry are subtly inching forward in order to succeed in getting the band-aid gently laid, flat and chaotic right in the middle of his face and upon his nose. It’s such an overwhelmingly quiet, close moment, one where Louis moves with intent and concentrates on the boy’s nose with absolutely no idea of what’s going on himself, one where Harry doesn’t even appear to have breathed in the last few seconds as Louis is smoothing it down one last time. It’s just dark all around, Harry’s mother probably long having left for work as she usually does on a night like this, having already prepared something warm to eat on the stove for when her boy gets home, and everything is just so familiar about this very curb where the car sits, that all Louis can _be_ is calm, and comfortable, and immersed in this moment as the whole band-aid thing goes on.

“There,” Louis says finally, tapping Harry’s chin twice with his thumb before moving to slide back and rest in his seat.

It’s a little over a while before Harry’s saying anything, Louis simply sensing the frazzled, silent way he most likely blinks his eyes more times than he needs to before he sits back in his seat as well.

“Thank you,” he replies, his voice bordering on a whisper.

Louis barely curves a corner of his lip in response, letting his gaze eventually slide back over to the boy next to him again, still not having any idea of what he wants in this moment. He just knows that he doesn’t want to argue. And that he doesn’t want to leave. And that he also doesn’t want to talk about things.

“Um,” Harry begins, breaking the silence himself and scratching at his head with his finger briefly, Louis blinking at him inquisitively. He speaks gently and almost hesitantly, Louis simply letting his ears take in whatever it is he wants to get out. “I was—I was with Ezra. That’s why I was there. He’s working as a tutor during the summer. We’re like…seeing each other again, I guess.”

Louis conveys his understanding in the form of barely raising his eyebrows for half a second, shifting his gaze lullingly toward the straightforward view of the suburban neighborhood out of his front window, not really knowing how to feel about that.

“Alright,” he replies, his tone mellowed.

“But—like I don’t know, really,” Harry begins, half-chuckling. “Nothing's set in stone or anything. I’m still on the fence with the whole ghosting me thing, like—maybe I’m just letting him treat me like I’m disposable because it's rare that a guy like him ever comes around for me, and I—I really keep thinking _am_ I just setting myself up to get played again—“

“ _Shhhh_ ,” Louis finds himself suddenly bursting with, not being able to contain it for even a second longer.

“Shhhh?” Harry asks, incredulous within an instant. “What do you mean _shhh_ I’m pouring my heart out—“

“ _Shhhh,_ ” Louis cuts in again, the sound gentle and encompassing as he shifts in his seat in order to be leaned in Harry’s direction again, his _shhh_ ’s evolving into low, almost muted “ _shut up shut up shut up_ ”’s as he brings himself in close to Harry, elbow rested on the barrier between them.

Harry’s chest showcases how breathless he is as he and Louis’ noses are now suddenly within a hair of each other, Louis somehow hypnotized as he’s now finally gotten the boy to silence himself, providing Louis with the perfect opportunity to gaze at his mouth and internally weigh out the consequences of what he’s about to do right now. What he _wants_ to do right now, so much so that his lips might jump right off of his face if he doesn’t do it.

He takes the time to reflect on the boy in front of him, so silent and dazed in the blink of an eye, all from Louis barely even lifting a finger. He reflects on how Harry’s had to grow up at a much earlier age than people around him and how he's had a front seat in watching it. How, even though he’s now that grown up, mature boy who stands his ground in any situation and rarely shies away from a fight, there are moments like these, which sends the boy back into a time warp where he’s innocent and clueless again, the curves of his smooth cheeks and the quiet wonder of his eyes never growing in age.

He snaps back to this younger, unknowing version of himself sometimes. A lot now that they’ve gone and fucked things up between themselves a bit, and Louis’ finding himself addicted to it. Addicted to that flustered twinkle in the boy’s eye whenever Louis teases him; he’d always sometimes seen it when Harry’d been dealing with other guys or talking about dates he’d gone on, but now Louis has experienced the sensation of it firsthand—for _him,_ and he’s not sure how he’s supposed to give it up now.

This boy in front of him is just…something distinct. And rare, for a person like Louis to align so well with. And he doesn’t know what to fucking do about it.

He finds himself falling forward just a bit, his forehead gently pressing against the boy in front of him, Harry only letting out a faint, practically nonexistent hum of question in response, as though he needs someone to clarify what’s happening right now. Louis won’t clarify anything though. The thrill of Harry being thrown off, rose red, taken down to a hush by these sudden gestures is exactly what Louis’ so obsessed with.

Louis makes it all happen very slowly; makes every movement count, which is a particularly harsh contrast to the last few times they’ve done this. It’s a practiced and drawn out gesture, the way his fingers lift up in order to barely caress the tip of the boy’s chin, just as his own eyes close and he lets his senses take the lead.

He finds it alluring, simply the way Harry doesn’t just go for it himself, the boy probably dazed and still starry eyed in bewilderment for all Louis knows, although with every growing second, the boy’s breaths upon his bottom lip increase in heat.

It’s extremely slow, how their lips weave into each other once they meet, Louis not even having fully tilted his head yet as it happens. He’s pretty sure a lot of the leaning in that went down happened on his own part, because it feels like it even takes Harry a moment to alert his lips to move, his mind probably still befuddled at how sweet and out of character this moment is right now.

Louis just takes his time to inch a bit more into Harry’s space when their lips break for a half second, getting himself nuzzled in more comfortably as he tilts his head and goes in again, and Harry just follows his mouth the best way he can manage, each joining of their lips long and drawn to its very end, like something out of a poetry book as Louis continues to softly hold his chin.

The faint, nervous shudder of Harry exhaling through his nose can be heard by Louis while they kiss, and it causes his lips to barely twitch upward on one side in between pecks, fairly certain he’s hypnotized the poor boy by now. They continue on without rush, lips over lips and tongues almost fully out of the way in favor of a more saccharine, gentle feel.

What Harry fails to realize is Louis’ hypnotized too. Or else he wouldn’t be doing this. Literally everything in his head and life and heart has screamed at him not to do this—to _never_ do this, yet here he is, falling subdued to the boy in front of him and just _doing_ it anyway. He can’t fucking stop.

He _does_ stop, though—briefly. He moves his hand that was once upon Harry’s chin, instead placing it against his chest in order to gently push him backward, straightening his arm until he has the boy laid back against his seat on the passenger side, and Harry opens his eyes long after Louis has already opened his, the way it happens appearing as though the boy has just woken up from a delirious sleep.

Louis brings his thumb to his own lips, biting down on it as he ponders with himself, Harry sitting there complaisant and up for anything, and Louis wishing he could fight his spur-of-the-moment temptations.

It only takes him two seconds to remember he’s never been good at fighting those things anyway, which is why he’s soon pushing open his door, closing it behind himself and hearing the shut of it echo throughout the empty neighborhood streets in the night. He takes the short journey to immediately open the backdoor, merely sensing the way Harry is wildly confused, yet staying put through the entire process of it.

“Fuck,” Louis mutters, his feet being crowded with a bunch of the useless junk that occupies the floor of his car as he’s pulling the door closed, once again leaving the two of them alone in this cloud of muted sound. “You really need to remember to get your shit out of my car sometimes.” Louis reaches down in order to scoop many of the items up and out of the way, which include Harry's old notebooks, handy stuff for maintenance of his car that he never uses, and even a feathery fedora hat that Louis' almost certain is one of Harry's theater props. He needs at least _some_ type of foot space before they can proceed any further. All the while Harry has shifted only slightly, wordlessly watching Louis take a brief clean-up session as he looks over the shoulder of the seat.

It happens abruptly, the way Louis switches from finally clearing up some space to his liking and then rapidly grabs the boy’s face where it’s still turned toward him from the front seat, bringing their lips back together and instantly causing the atmosphere of the car to grow that much warmer.

Harry sinks into it much faster than the first time, Louis letting go of his caressed face and instead gripping the collar of his stupid cargo jacket in order to convey the message to him. It’s a message that Harry deciphers quite quickly, their tongues now beginning their gentle tease at one another as Harry’s breathing more heavily through his nose and shifting in order to crawl himself into the backseat with Louis.

Their latched mouths don’t even manage to detach once on Harry’s journey toward the back, the locking of their lips much more tightly intense now than before as Louis finds himself with his back flush to the seat, Harry in his lap kissing him impassionedly.

An involuntary noise of gratitude comes from Louis’ mouth as Harry’s lips are attached between his, his own hands digging through the boy’s hair and nape at one hand, and hugging his back and waist against himself with the other hand, everything in his pants already reacting to the memory of the last time they were positioned like this, Harry nicely upon his lap in the exact same way.

Harry’s needy fingers seem to be torn on whether they should be caressing Louis’ face or roaming through his hair or pushing at his shirt, but eventually, his shirt is what gets toyed with most, Louis finding it having been stretched out enough by Harry’s eager hands to where the stretchy, cheap material is draping off of him, much of Louis’ chest cold and exposed to the air as he somehow finds himself mouthing at the boy’s neck, not ever knowing how up close and personal he’d get with the citrus scent of Harry’s body wash that he used to mock him for buying.

Louis in turn conjures up the idea to get Harry’s jacket off, their lips taking a break and their noses staying connected in heat as he pushes the thing past his shoulders and right off, Harry helping out rapidly and shoving his arms out of the holes himself, right before diving back into Louis with a piercing kiss, just as he comes down on the boy’s hips with a purposeful downward grind.

Louis responds by letting his teeth gently sink into Harry’s bottom lip, finding himself needing an outlet for the way Harry starts to find a steady rhythm, moving his hips downward and in a circular fashion until he can feel how hard Louis is, right against him and through way too many layers of fabric.

Louis doesn’t know why, but what makes it all the more enrapturing is that the both of them can hardly even see anything. Everything outside is pretty much completely dark now, save for a lonely street light in the distance where it doesn’t even reach them in the slightest.

But Louis can’t also help but wonder…is that what makes it easier?

Oh, fuck it. Louis doesn’t care.

Especially now that Harry has escalated everything within seconds by reaching down between them for Louis’ pants, undoing the drawstring in front of them as though he hates the strings themselves, and shifting himself on down and off the seat at the same time as he’s pulling at Louis’ sweats in order to get them down.

And…Louis can’t argue with that.

Can’t argue with the way he can barely see the faint shine of the boy’s gaze, maintaining direct contact with him from down below as he kisses the length along the side, his hand working the base and even the mere feel of his breath against it causing Louis to try not to shudder.

Like, this just doesn’t make any fucking _sense_. Why is Harry making these filthy eyes at him as he’s lapping him up at every side, working on him at the tip, working him up and down as much as he can with his hand in between each time he takes it into his mouth—this is just not something that they _do_. Yet it's just so lust-filled and amazing and addicting that all Louis can do is throw his head back and scratch his finger nails at the cushions.

Harry has done this before. Like, yeah Louis knows he’s _done_ it before, due to the many unwarranted conversations Louis’ rolled his eyes at, but right now, feeling himself hit the back of Harry’s throat as he remains all the way inside of him, tongue hot against his length and the boy probably desperately needing to breathe—this is definitely a different type of confirmation that Harry has done this before. And several times.

It comes to a point where the only thing Louis can hear are the wet sounds of skin against lips, the occasional sputtering, the choked humming, Louis well aware of the way the boy is even taking pleasure in this himself, and it’s all bringing Louis to a point of no return, his hips shifting in the seat and creases forming by his closed eyes.

When he comes in the boy’s mouth, Harry’s lips don’t even budge from around his length, although he most certainly sputters a bit when he’s swallowing it all down, Louis’ mouth hung open and his hands clinging to the bottom of the seat with a taut strain.

“C’mere,” Louis finds himself breathing, demandingly gripping the boy’s chin again and not even caring about the fact that he’s tasting himself as their lips meet, tongues meshed and Harry endlessly ready to bow to his every need.

Louis knows it’s going to take him a while to get back into it as his dick remains quite lifeless at the moment, so they spend a lot of time kissing some more, whether it be on the lips with their tongues meeting in between, or Louis alongside the boy’s neck, faint bite marks forming on his skin that Louis can’t see yet.

He can feel it, in the way Harry can’t stay still upon his hips, the way he’s fidgety from one cheek to the other. He wants to ride him again. And Louis can’t deprive him of that, can he? He’d be a man with no heart.

Which is why it isn’t long before they’re at it again, energy not having died down between them even a little once Harry’s pants are just as lowered as they need to be in order for the boy to get himself situated upon Louis’ length the way he likes.

It’s just like a drug, just like the first time, that initial, outrageously tight feel of Harry sliding down onto him. This time around it instantly makes Louis’ loose grip in the boy’s hair to tighten, not knowing how else to contain himself and deter the fact that he’s already so close to the fucking edge.

It’s so clear that Harry’s more accustomed to it now too, because it only takes a couple of practiced, gyrating strokes of his hips for his jaw to be slack, open lips allowing his moans to trap themselves within this car, Louis watching the boy get lost in it as Harry closes his eyes, maintaining a grip on either side of Louis’ neck and focused on making this good for himself.

Louis reaches between them without thinking much of it, getting a slippery hold of Harry’s length and simply growing obsessed with watching him slowly rise in avidity, sweat beading upon his nose and eyes rapturously closed while Louis is deep in and out of him.

He can instantly see the effect it has on Harry, the way his hands tighten around the sides of Louis’ neck and his eyebrows draw together tightly, and Louis uses the sight as a reason to jerk him faster, spreading the precome with his fingers to allow for a more slick movement. Just the mere wet sound of it, paired with the slapping of skin against skin as Harry doesn’t slow down, _added_ by his now open-mouthed sounds of enthusiasm as he brings his face into Louis’ cheek, are things Louis doesn’t ever want to do without.

He almost can’t even breathe right now, honestly. Both because Harry is just about choking him, and also because overstimulation is hurling itself at him full force.

“ _Oh god_ ,” Harry breathes, still holding Louis firmly as his head comes back up so that their foreheads are within an inch or two of each other. His eyes are still closed, Louis looking into the eyelids of them as his mouth remains wide and his fast hand around Harry’s dick is nothing but a blur, a sob getting caught in the back of his throat as they just keep _going_ , Harry now fully bouncing at his fastest pace yet. Even with his eyes closed like this, he almost looks like he’s about to cry, the way he just mouths these words Louis can’t understand and doesn’t have any sound coming out of his lips.

And then he’s _screaming_.

_Screaming_ like something out of those rare, amateur gems of movies that are only stumbled upon once in a blue moon, and Louis can’t fucking hold off anymore.

His hips grow a mind of their own while he’s riding out his orgasm with his palms to Harry's ass, thrusting up into Harry just as quickly and purposefully as Harry is bouncing down onto him, and it’s clear in the way they grasp onto each other, and shake, and stutter, and tear at the eyes, that they come at the same time.

It lasts for so long. So long that Louis’ completely convinced he’s outside of his body currently, watching the two of them go at it from right outside of the car, looking into the window.

Fuck, he wonders if anyone’s actually doing that right now. It could very well be possible.

He doesn’t even make a move to turn his head to the side and check however, eyes intense and zoned in on watching Harry come down from it, shuddering with every movement of his hips as Louis still remains inside of him, his own pink, plump lips bitten and raw—both from their making out and from _himself_ , it seems.

Louis can’t…not be obsessed with this.

Like, he knows this is bad and all—that smart part in his head has screamed it to him several times by now, he gets it. But is he really supposed to shake his head and turn himself away the next time the boy offers himself to him like this? Does he really trust himself to do that? This is Louis Tomlinson we’re talking about. He is a man with needs.

He gets the answers to those rhetorical questions pretty soon—almost immediately, really, because he and Harry end up going yet _another_ round in his car, kick started by a heavily breathing Harry taking Louis’ hand and placing it around his own neck (an allude to the other night, Louis believes), and Louis wasting no time in taking the lead by using the grip on his neck in order to get him against the window and, erm…do it in that position, is how he’ll describe it. It happens _again_ just like that, Harry fully bent over across the remainder of the backseat, hands making foggy shapes against the window, Louis behind him with a hand gripping his neck and another holding his waist…and they just go at it.

Or go _crazy_ on each other, if you will.

And then it’s over.

_Really_ over this time, because Louis’ dick will seriously fall off.

The car is just cloudy to the brim with that raw, significant smell of _sex_ once they’re lax and fucked out, both of their hair strands even damp with it as though they’ve legitimately just gone exercising at the local gym.

He doesn’t go inside the boy’s house when they part ways.

And Harry doesn’t push him about it also, either because he’s too slumped to continue stringing words together or because he’s tired of trying, but Louis soon finds himself letting the boy out of his car after the boy has pulled back on his clothes properly, offering half of a joke about how life shattering it would be if Anne had gone late to work and stumbled upon the sight of them on her walk from the front door, and then he's letting the door shut. They don’t even say goodbye, or goodnight, or anything. But it doesn’t feel like a bad sign. At least to Louis it doesn’t.

So Louis simply decides that’s all there is to it. He pulls away from Harry’s curb after starting up the car, and takes the five minute drive to his own place, knowing it’s for the best that he didn’t follow Harry into his house like he usually would. He doesn’t need an escape at Harry’s place, because his own place is ultimately where he will always end up. He’d been chained to the personal hell that is his house way before this boy, and he’s definitely going to have to get used to still being chained to it after the boy.

This is _his_ hell to deal with.

It’s a _vacant_ hell though, luckily enough tonight since his father’s truck isn’t in the driveway and he’s most likely at work. Louis makes a point to check the mail out front once he’s parked his car and walked his way up to the mailbox, really not wanting to endure another one of his father’s screaming episodes about how much he hates having to bring his mail up to him.

Louis doesn’t mind getting it himself, it’s just that before this recent semester he rarely ever got mail, so it’s been a hard transition suddenly _getting_ stuff now, since colleges apparently know he’s graduating high school and all that creepy pushy stuff.

When he’s flipping through the mail on the way up to the front door, not being able to see much but knowing how to discern his name across the envelopes as best he can, he doesn’t see anything of value. Generic college mail, generic college mail, generic college mail, overdue payment mail, potential lawsuit mail, generic college mail.

And then he sees something that catches his eye, as soon as he closes the front door behind himself and switches on the living room light.

It’s that summer program.

One of the very _few_ ones he’d applied to on a whim, only half trying to actually put forth effort even though he’d known he wouldn’t get accepted into them any way, and even then, knowing he still wouldn’t get the financial help he needed in order to attend the actual school.

Except here he is, staring at an acceptance after having torn the thing open and unfolded the flimsy paper.

Acceptance. To one of the ones he silently admits he’d been just a bit hopeful about. The one with the interesting science courses and stuff.

And it comes with a full scholarship, given he attends the early summer program. Before the actual fucking _semester_.

Finally, something to show for his stupid grades.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> harry's pov is split into two chapters bc i made it too long

Ah, the last event Harry will ever have to attend in relation to his high school.

Or at least, he hopes so.

It’s not that Harry’s in a rush to say sayonara to everyone he graduated with and ready to prepare himself for the next phase that includes college and figuring out whether he wants to major in theater or one of the basic ones that will guarantee him a career, he’s in _no_ sort of hurry, and in fact, kind of wishes time would move just a smidge slower.

It’s just that the senior events, and reminiscing activities, and banquets, and award ceremonies, and grad parties are now dragging into the summer a bit too much, well after his last day of school, which is just criminal.

Actually, Harry probably would’ve never attended another senior class event if it were up to him, but surprisingly, whether anyone wants to believe it or not because of how untrue it sounds, Louis was the one who suggested that they go. Quite enthusiastically, too.

So here they are, making themselves normal, avid attendees to the Senior Day of Beach Fun event, even though it’s not really on a beach due to the fact that there are none close enough, and it’s just at one of the sandy parks nearby with tons of grass area and bench pavilions, where cake walks and relay race games and obstacle courses and other prize-winning activities will take place. There’s supposed to be a lot of grilled food too.

Harry has come dressed in the most ridiculous get up he can manage, complete with a safari hat, not on his head and instead resting behind his nape as it’s loosely strapped to his neck, a dramatic dot of sunscreen on his nose, a Hawaiian printed scarlet shirt that he had to quickly iron out before coming here, black sunglasses to shield his eyes, and basic cargo shorts that are always a fun time. He’d aspired to play the role of a jet-lagged vacation uncle today, pretty much just taking the piss out of the fact that this isn’t a beach, and in appearance, he’s pretty sure he’s succeeded.

Louis walks along the sand next to him, the both of them having already parked and making their way towards the main action of the event in what seems like a trying, never-ending journey across endless sand pebbles and under the torturous sun, and he’s dressed much more mellow than Harry, choosing to wear a grainy tan t-shirt (that grips his muscles in just the subtlest of ways) and dark gray joggers that nearly drag against the sand. He’s wearing sandals though, so Harry definitely acknowledges his slight attempt at the theme for today.

He and Louis…they’re good.

And he doesn’t mean it in a _maybe_ or _at least I’m hoping we are_ kind of way. It was just suddenly, he and Louis weren’t quite _clicking_ for a bit due to Harry losing his ever loving mind and Louis just completely shutting him out, and then they were fucking again, and somehow, things have gotten right back on track since then. 

But even though they’re now once again in a comfortable area where they can be around each other without problem, they don’t ever really acknowledge the fact that they have sex. Like…it’s as though they’re different people when they have sex, it seems. Harry still doesn’t even know how to get used to it, the hungry way Louis’ eyes sink into his while he’s tipping over the edge, as though just the sight of Harry is doing tons more than what’s going on with both of their dicks.

But when it switches back to normal, and they’re quarreling over stupid things like what snacks to get at the convenience store, they don’t even talk about it. They don’t mention it. Their best friendship and sex lives exist on two different planets.

But this is _good_ , because it means they’re balancing it nicely. Today, Louis has even begun _smiling_. Like, genuinely _smiling_ , and he didn’t even do that often _before_ they started fucking.

Harry can faintly hear what sounds like the booming of speakers in the distance as Louis shields his eyes with his arm (even though he’s wearing sunglasses already—these shades being particularly huge ones that Harry finds ridiculous) and they snicker and mumble between themselves about how they just narrowly dodged a splattering of bird poop.

Normally, Louis would grumble on the way to something like this, but he’d literally _suggested_ they go. He’d called Harry first thing in the morning, demanding that they go together in order to "make the most of" their "final scraps of high school” (his words not Harry’s) and Harry’d been too overcome with pleasant delight that he didn’t even question the fact that Louis’ immediate plan of action wasn’t to go with his cooler friends.

Like…Louis’ just talking to him again. And that’s all Harry wanted. He’ll take anything that comes with this.

“Okay, okay,” Louis says at some point, rubbing his palms together as he comes to a slow stop, bringing Harry to follow suit. “How about we make this walk a lot less long and endless?”

Harry doesn’t say anything, instead offering his question through the raise of one of his eyebrows, the two of them now facing each other.

“Foot race?” Louis asks, voice raising half a pitch and both rows of teeth showing after the question, cutely and demanding to be appeased.

Harry crosses his arms, faking as though taking the time to think about it as he presses his lips together briefly. “Winner gets what?”

Louis scratches at his chin, the both of them still only being able to stare into the shades over each other’s eyes. “Um—winner gets to reach the speakers first and request for them to change this god awful techno music.”

“You’re on,” Harry nods, preparing to hold out a hand in order for them to shake on it—but not before Louis’ completely disregarding the hand and already starting on his feet.

“Son of a—“ Harry grunts, already starting up his sprint and holding a hand to the hat that’s behind his head in order to keep it steady.

It’s basic knowledge that Harry is nowhere at level with Louis in speed, staying one step ahead, and most certainly athletic skill, which explains why the boy is several feet ahead of him within seconds, the both of them now significantly more in tune with other people who are making their way towards the main pavilion where food is being grilled.

Of course, though—of _freaking_ course, Harry trips over one of his own shoelaces that had apparently come untied, which sends him scrambling to catch himself so he won’t face plant in the sand, and then rolling over in clumsiness a few times just for good measure.

He’d hardly even ran for five seconds.

He finds himself on his back, arms sprawled out on either side of him whilst the sun beats down on him like an angry god, and he could honestly care less about the fleeting glances his way as some of his fellow peers are making their journeys past him upon the sand.

“Jesus, you didn’t stand a chance, did you?” Louis says, his words coming into the air before the figure of his body does, the shadow he casts alleviating Harry from the burning yellow orb even if only for a short while.

“It was you,” Harry mumbles, voice whiny as he grabs a hold of the hand Louis has extended out toward him, albeit still staying flat on his back and making no move to stand up. “You fucking…you did it with your mind.”

“Yes, because telekinesis is a real—“

Harry abruptly using the momentum of sitting up in order to pull Louis into the sand right along with him is what interferes with his sentence, the boy immediately gasping in surprise and shoving Harry violently after he gets his face out of the sand. He also takes it the extra unnecessary mile by popping one of Harry’s shoes off before Harry can even realize what he’s doing, the boy practically using the thing as a shovel as he scoops all of the sand into it. He’s practically giving Harry a guaranteed entire day of uncomfortable pebble feet. Truly devious.

“ _Louis,_ ” Harry whines, his tone emphatic as he snatches his shoe back from the boy and proceeds to shake it out. “You know I hate pebble feet. It’s one of my pet peeves, you _know_ that.”

“Stop being a big baby,” Louis replies with a giggle, pushing himself up from the ground and dusting his hands off on his pants on the way up.

“No, I won’t actually,” Harry replies, still sat fully on the ground with his legs spread out in front of him like a child, tapping the sneaker wildly against the ground and slightly wriggling his naked, socked foot. “Not if you don’t switch shoes with me.”

He’s really just being teasy at this point, sometimes taking miniature squabbles to an unnecessary point just to get a chance to poke at Louis, since, you know, he kind of likes him now.

Oh yeah, that’s a thing. He didn’t really think he needed to say it.

Louis fully bending over where he stands and getting in Harry’s face is something Harry’s fairly unprepared for, his eyes almost crossing behind his sunglasses as Louis’ nose doesn’t even float more than an inch away from his, making everything in the beach, on earth, under the sun, float away just like that.

“Or what?” Louis asks, lowly and cooly, Harry not even having noticed how one of his own hands had sunk into the sand. 

Even though it’s impossible to tell, he can literally _feel_ the insatiable, intimate way Louis is gazing at his lips in that _way_ he does, as though there’s an astounding piece of artwork displayed upon his bottom lip or something, and it subdues him for a moment, Harry not really knowing what they’re talking about anymore, and not caring either as he has his face slightly tilted up in order to look at him.

As much as it’s a feeling that normal people go through when falling for someone, Harry hates the way it happens _every time_ —his heart race flies through the roof in an instant, he flushes a shade of pinkish red from head to toe, and he becomes completely unable to form words in the middle of becoming so breathless, literally _every time_ Louis flips the switch and gives the boy his earnest, undivided attention like this. It can only best be described as a genuine spell.

And it’s an _especially_ powerful one now that Louis’ doing it in a place where there are people they know, some walking past, but Harry not being able to know if they’re looking or not, because if Louis doesn’t seem to care, why should he care?

Harry doesn’t even want to go to the beach day anymore. He kind of just wants to make out with him. Or have sex with him in some semi-public corner, since public is clearly their thing.

But he doesn’t get that wish when Louis is shaking his head at him and urging him to come on, Harry pushing his foot into his shoe and moving to drag himself along, just like he’s always been known to drag himself along to Louis’ every maneuver.

Harry’s guessed that maybe word has spread since that night Louis had been a little too drunk for his own good and pretty much publicly declared he wanted to bang Harry in one of the bedrooms of Liam’s house. Maybe that’s why Louis doesn’t care right now, because it’s mostly out in the open. Harry still doesn’t know for sure though.

They still haven’t properly talked anything out, but Louis seems to have miraculously gotten over whatever hurdle had been troubling him, so Harry feels its best to just leave it at that.

Once they actually reach the student pavilion and have helped themselves to grilled hot dogs, casual conversation with their peers, and a three-legged race where Louis and Harry came in an amazing tenth place and won participation ribbons, Harry’s actually the one who gets whisked away by a group he gets along with from his woodshop class, inviting him over to play a game of volleyball and Harry not having it in him to refuse due to his secret obsession with occasionally playing the game.

Louis decides not to join him, instead giving into the constant plea of his few soccer friends who’ve decided this event was cool enough to come to (which does not include very many of them of course) as they sit off to the side under giant umbrellas and drink hard lemonade and don't make any efforts to participate in anything. And it’s okay; he and Louis talk about it, they know where they’re going to be, and they part ways on okay terms. It’s almost like a relationship.

Yes, Harry is crazy and obsessive, he knows. He can’t help it, and this isn’t news to him, okay?

“Hey, asswipe,” Harry calls, raising his voice a smidge as he’s taking his position on one side of the net, glancing over his shoulder at Louis’ retreat. “Don’t forget I exist and leave me stranded here.”

When Louis responds with the wave of his middle finger over his shoulder, Harry has to swallow the bubbling grin he wants to make, because things are just going so _smoothly_.

And then they aren’t going smoothly.

But that isn’t until much later.

Actually, for a good amount of time, everything is going fine, because he’s on absolute _fire_ during this volleyball game, all of his serves are amazingly well-executed, and he’s genuinely enjoying himself and all the delighted praise he's getting for his unforeseen skills.

But it all goes downhill when a horrible serve from the other side sends the ball way out of bounds, and Harry has to jog over the sand in order to retrieve it.

It's a long and weary journey; one where Harry casually takes note of the fact that he passes by Louis' friends and doesn't see him anywhere, although he doesn't freak out about it because it's not like they're married or anything—

And then there he is.

Well really, there _they_ are. Right behind the last giant umbrella Harry has to walk past before reaching the volleyball. Louis and Jas. Lips just now messily becoming unattached. Jas, who Harry thought (or hoped) had ceased to exist, or died or something.

And the look in Louis’ eyes isn’t that of a deer in headlights, no—it’s _Harry’s_ eyes that display that exact emotion, his face soft and blank and rapidly blinking as though he’s sorry for even seeing this as he struggles to pick up the ball between his hands and pull his eyes away from Louis’ hand cozy around her bare waist as she wears her knot-tied red bikini top and jean shorts. Louis couldn't look more indifferent and unruffled in the face, appearing just as he would in any other instant ( _before_ their recent shenanigans), as though maybe Harry has something to tell him, or something. Even _Jas_ is more affected than him, although it shows only in slightly quirking eyebrows and blinking eyes as she's still retreating from being so wrapped up with him.

“I—I’m, um,” Harry begins, snorting briefly and tucking the ball under his arm as his feet move backward to prepare for retreat. “Sorry.”

And he just walks back to where the volleyball people are waiting for him, foot after foot, exhale after inhale, and he just tries to steady everything in his mind for a moment. Not jump to extreme meltdowns, even though his closed fists are nearly shaking with it.

But no, he won’t do that. He’ll just finish this game, and not think much of it, and just fucking not care about anything. He won’t care about a fucking thing. He’s a robot man.

Once the ball has been returned back to the designated server, Harry’s getting himself in the same slightly bent position, arms stretched out in front of him and fists ready to bump the ball if need be, and even though everything in his body language says he’s gotten his head right back into this game, his gradually reddening, glassy eyes tell a totally different story.

“Dude, you okay?” he hears Colin ask him to his right, clearly being just a bit inquisitive, since it _is_ just he and Harry in this right corner, positioned where they would best be able to hit the ball.

Harry just sniffs and nods his head, stone-like in position as they all still wait for the ball to be served. “Yeah.”

And then the ball is served, almost just as horribly as the first time, and it eventually comes flying in Harry’s general direction, perfect for him to land a hit in order to gain their team another point.

But Harry doesn’t even move.

It pretty much falls at his feet and rolls for just a little bit, Harry’s ears shut off to the disgruntled sounds of everyone around him and his body coming back to a standing position.

“No ‘m not,” Harry says lowly, mostly to himself as he simply sinks a hand in his hair and walks off, literally not being able to hear anything around him.

He’s almost dizzy in the head and most certainly unsteady in his footsteps whilst on his journey to find the most faraway place to seclude himself, which ends up being under the giant park pavilion, almost no one there as he sits, everyone else clearly opting to do much funner stuff, like play volleyball, or kickball, or pour themselves up some fruity drinks, or make out with each other under a giant umbrella.

He just sits himself down, nearest to the end of one of the benches of the long wooden tables positioned underneath the shade, and he thinks. Or tries not to think. Or tries too hard not to think that the only thing he ends up actually doing is _thinking._

He’s sad. His feelings are hurt, and he’s certainly not going to dance around that fact and try to put on a mask as though stumbling upon that horrific encounter didn’t have any effect on him.

But it was _Harry_ who decided to get his feelings involved in this whole fiasco. _Not_ Louis. In fact, Louis has done nothing other than try to shake Harry off, and given the fact that Harry’s known him for years and is well aware of his inability to care about much and tie himself down to one thing, this shouldn’t be a surprise to Harry.

Why does it feel like such a huge one, though?

Harry guesses he’d just thought—or more so hoped that the whole player, seamlessly switching, every girl's guy thing wouldn’t be the same if he were dealing with Harry, because they have history, and they mean a lot to each other, and all that. He guesses he’s wrong.

So he’ll just mope with the knowledge of that. Just sit here with his head sideways upon the hard wooden table, cheek squished and uncomfortable and the faraway sounds of squealing and spraying water and laughter taunting him. He’ll just sit here and bask in the negative emotions of it all. He won’t cry though. He definitely won’t cry.

He also definitely won’t think about the fact that they may even still be making out right now.

Harry stays in that exact same slumped over position for a substantial amount of time, sufficiently miserable and weighed down by a heavy heart. He doesn’t make any move to cheer himself up as the day ages on, an hour or two drifting by like a gentle wave. There’s no use. He just wants to go home now. He wants to crawl under his bed and disappear there. The only few times he moves is when one or two people come by and halfheartedly check if he’s okay or ask if he wants to join some game, or the several times where flies bombard his space and he has to swat the pesky things away.

Harry decides he’s had enough of this at some point, feeling as though the pink, blue, and purple hues of the aging sunset are good enough reason for them to be heading home now. Because, oh yeah, he’d driven here with Louis. They’ve both had their fun by now, right?

It seems people are leaving too, Harry even receiving a few pats on his back that he figures are in goodbye from people he doesn't even lift his head to acknowledge. All the heavy back pats in the world could not cheer him up right now. He just wants to go home.

After a while the thought crosses Harry's mind that the boy could’ve left him, which is the usual when he fucks off with some girl and completely disregards the fact that he’d driven to a place with Harry. Why is Harry even his best friend again?

Harry decides that just won’t do, however, which is why he finds himself hastily getting up from the bench once the sky’s colors are nearing more of a dark purplish color than anything, and he stalks across the the sand, and the grass, and the abandoned activity setups, in search of the boy he’d come to this thing with. He doesn’t _care_ if he stumbles upon him with his tongue down Jas' throat this time, Harry’s ready to _go_ , and they’re leaving together.

He doesn’t expect to come across him before he even makes the trek all the way to the distant parking lot, already having accepted that the boy had been getting ready to leave without him. Instead he finds Louis lone and off to the side, walking along the thin railing of one of the long benches and seeming as though he’s challenging himself to stay balanced, his arms out on either side of him and his eyes downward focused.

Harry would’ve missed him easily, seeing as he’d been dead set on moving forward and Louis appeared as a kind of background character off to the side that Harry didn’t think much of. But that’s him alright, unneeded sunglasses still clad upon his nose, which instantly urges Harry to take his own off of his eyes and slide them into his hair.

Harry doesn’t make his approach hasty when he walks up to him, sliding his hands into the deep pockets of his shorts and not even really wanting to talk to him anymore, if he’s being honest. He’s just doing it for the sake of getting home tonight.

“Can we go…” Harry begins gently. The reason his request fades in a gradual, halting fashion is because once he’s closer to the boy, not seeing him as a mere faraway lavender shadow anymore, he catches a more clear sight of his right hand—more specifically, what he has in between his index and middle finger.

Harry’s feet are moving more diligently in the boy’s direction without delay, his eyes wide and disbelieving once he comes within close range of it, standing just a foot or two lower than the boy is and only slightly not believing what his eyes are telling him.

“Fuck is this?” Harry asks incredulously, eyes darting up from the lit, smoky cigarette in the boy’s palm (who continues dallying upon the bench, legs kicked out and balance swaying), to the boy’s face, determined for their eyes to meet. “ _Louis_.”

“What?” the boy asks tiredly, finally bringing both of his feet next to each other and facing Harry’s general direction, not making a big deal out of bringing the cigarette to his lips and taking _much_ too casual of a drag, especially considering Harry has never seen him smoke before.

“How long has this been happening?” Harry asks, nostrils flared and eyes not leaving Louis’ shades.

Louis takes a moment to nonchalantly tap his fingers against his lips, mumbling near inaudibly. “Let’s see—one, two, three,” Louis begins, voice low and unheard as he counts off on his fingers and looks up. “Yesterday, but technically, since my dad has been smoking in the house for as long as I can remember, practically my whole life.”

“So what, are you a smoker now?” Harry asks, having to keep his feet up with Louis as the boy has now gone back to walking one foot in front of the other upon the railing. “That’s really a habit you want to pick up, because it’ll definitely make your life better, or something—“

“ _Stop_ —with the unneeded lectures,” Louis fires, only coming out of his element slightly as he faces Harry again and shakes his hands in front of his face. “Okay? Just let it be, and we can keep doing what we’re doing.”

“Except I can’t do that, Lou,” Harry says, making his voice softer, more pleading whilst his big eyes blink up at the boy. “Clearly, I can sit back, and take a bunch of bullshit from you, and beat myself up about crap between us that I don't understand, but one thing I won’t do is lay here and watch you follow in the footsteps of your father—even a _little_ bit.”

“It’s just smoking, Haz,” Louis replies just as quietly, seeming to have begun to cave in on himself as his arms fold over one another and he brings the cigarette back up to his lips again, the way he sucks on it with purpose and intent pretty much creating the beginnings of a tear at Harry’s heart as he watches it, not knowing why it’s happening.

“Yeah, and it’s drinking, and it’s fucking off without telling anyone anything, and it’s—“

“And it’s fucking _drinking_ some more, and yelling at people about my problems, and winding up at a dead-end low paying job, and it’s fucking—having kids I don’t want by accident with mothers who fuck off as soon as the kid pops out!” Louis explodes, Harry’s brows jumping in surprise as the boy is tightening his fingers in his hair and nearly heaving with the energy of his burst. “It’s fucking _destiny_ , Harry! I can’t run away from it, I can’t escape it, so I won’t even bother trying.”

Harry’s lips are parted without much sound, his throat feeling tight and his mind not exactly aware of what to do, or what’s gotten Louis so abruptly pessimistic, and how to make it better. He’s gone from the numbing shock of stumbling upon him and Jas to now holding a desperation to assure him that he’s better than what his father makes him out to be and he doesn’t know how to handle the switch.

“What’s wrong, Lou?” Harry pretty much whispers, their faces close enough now that it’s somehow ended up being Louis, leaned down a bit throughout his rant in order for their faces to be near to each other.

Louis doesn’t say anything, instead still breathing out of his nose and looking particularly out of character as he stays so on edge, so tense, so _infuriated_ as his shoulders rise and lower.

And then something clicks within Harry.

God, the erratic, sudden peacefulness. The eagerness to actually go out and participate and be happy and pleasing to everybody—Harry should’ve known. Last time his father had laid hands on him, Louis had actually _participated_ in a school pep rally.

Harry's hands are moving on their own accord, both of them reaching forth for the sides of the boy’s sunglasses that he should definitely have taken off by now, seeing as the sun hasn’t been in a position to blind them for almost two hours.

What he finds underneath is disheartening, to say the least.

Louis’ left eye is almost completely purpled with a bruise that can only be described as fresh, it only fades just barely in the area under his eye, although additional reddish, tender bruises can be seen sprinkled across the bridge of his nose, finished with a blatant cut on his right eyelid, fresh and raised.

Louis doesn’t make a move to stop him, smack his hands away for exposing him like this. He just stays there, silent, accepting, and not having torn the assuring gaze of his eyes away from Harry, who now pushes his sunglasses back into his hair.

Harry doesn’t even know what to say. He just tries to convey the message of how sorry he is for him through his disbelieving, huge doe eyes, but he’s not sure it’s enough. He’s not sure _how_ it’ll be enough.

“Like I said,” Louis begins, voice endlessly quiet. “Can’t change destiny.”

And then he’s halfheartedly hopping himself down from the platform he’d been dallying upon, starting on the way towards the parking lot and just assuming Harry is following, even though Harry’s still right where he is, astounded and following the boy’s retreat with his solemn gaze. He watches him as Louis drops the cigarette on the ground on his journey, stomping it out in the sand without a care and still skipping into the sunset.

“Louis.”

“ _What_?” the boy asks a bit forcefully, turning around on his heel once he’s gotten significantly far and has realized Harry hasn’t moved to follow him. His shoulders rise up to his ears as his hands now remain in his joggers, glasses in his hair and bruise still seen from here. “Rumors spread. Some of them true, some of them not. _All_ of them disapproved by my dad, so. You said you wanted to go, let’s _go_.”

Everything today has pointed to it. How easy the boy has been to make happy, his eagerness to hang out with Harry, his effort to be pleasing to those around him—hell, that's probably even what he'd been doing with Jas too. The boy puts on just a bit of an extra cloak when it happens, just because that’s how much he doesn’t want anyone to worry about him, and how much he wants to be distracted from it. How much he only wants his issues to be known by himself, and dealt with by himself.

But nevertheless, Harry finds himself walking. He tries to suppress the tears that want to grow in his eyes, only rubbing at his sniffling nose once or twice on the long walk to where they parked, because he doesn’t want to inflame things any further if this is the way Louis’ going to be right now. He just doesn’t know how to deal with this. It used to be simple, they’d both say fuck that man and Louis would just happily stay at Harry’s place for as long as he’d like and Louis would explain to him what happened and they’d agree that he’s a douchebag—none of this, _he’s right, this is what I have to accept_ foolishness.

Harry can’t keep his trembling mouth sealed anymore once they’re reaching Louis’ car, Louis immediately approaching the driver’s side and Harry meeting him right there as well, eyes red and piercing and Louis caught off guard and questioning.

“I just don’t understand why you won’t fucking talk to me,” Harry says, words struggling on the way out and his feet determined as they bring him to step right in front of Louis. “Is there like a hex on your mouth, or something? We used to be able to just _talk_ —about _everything_ , and…“ He gestures uselessly, mouth open and wordless as he stares off for a moment. “What do I need to do, Louis?”

Louis’ quieted after Harry’s gotten done, now wearing his bruises loudly whilst they stand in front of each other, only a few other cars left in this vast, silent parking lot and the air cooling everything around them just a hint. Harry remains desperate and breathless, struggling to find even just a speck of _anything_ behind those quiet, uncaring tired eyes of his.

“We’re ruined,” Louis says simply, tonelessly.

Harry only barely mouths the word _what_ in response, not understanding and yearning for any clarification.

“Like everything,” Louis continues, shaking his head and shifting his eyes to look beyond Harry’s shoulder. “Everything between us is different. We ruined our friendship.”

Harry raises an eyebrow in the sky in response to that, figuring that now he should be grateful, having gotten an answer to a question that’s been eating him alive internally for weeks now.

Except he’s not convinced. Not with the way Louis can’t even look him in the eye right now, not with the bobbing of the boy’s throat in front of him, the way his nostrils twitch a bit as though it’s taking everything in him not to cry.

“Okay, yeah, everything is different,” Harry agrees, still barely producing sound and reaching down in between them for one of Louis’ palms. It’s the kind of cliché chick flick moment he’s always planned out in his head, the way he brings Louis’ hand into the air, holding it between his two palms and allowing it to press into his chest, right where the boy can feel his heartbeat, which is blasting through the _roof_ right now by the way. Especially since Louis’ eyes have come back over to meet his, silent and taken aback at what Harry’s getting at right now.

“But—that doesn’t mean it’s necessarily _ruined_ , like…um,” Harry begins, swallowing and wondering where he was going with this. “Do you feel that? I’m pretty sure you do…”

Louis doesn’t answer him explicitly, just keeping his eyes indifferently trained on their hands upon Harry’s chest, his lips slightly done apart.

“That’s—that’s what my heart does now. Every time I see you. It’s become regular,” Harry continues, that signature nervous laugh sprouting from his lips at the perfect moment. “Can you imagine, previously only having this feeling happen with shirtless pictures of Michael B. Jordan, or the two crushes I have per year? Now it happens nearly everyday, with the person I see _most_. It’s absolute _torture_.”

Louis still doesn’t say anything, his hand cemented there and their arms practically moving with the heartbeat they’re taking the time to observe.

“But it’s something that I don’t want to stop. Like, ever,” Harry continues, awkwardly laughing again. “So I’m sure that can’t be classified as something being _ruined_ , by any means. Different? Yes, definitely. But that doesn’t mean it’s bad.”

His breaths are much more trembling in nature now as he inhales and exhales, feeling as though he’s laid himself out on the sand for Louis to experiment on and he’s not even sure if he’s made any sense despite trying so hard to succeed in doing so.

“I’ve just trained myself to get used to the change,” he whispers, chest still heaving gently. “We can get used to it.”

Louis continues to remain mute, although there can be a definite change in demeanor seen in the way he holds his bottom lip with his teeth, the weight of one foot shifting onto the other, and his mind clearly moving around.

“Just please,” Harry breathes, the first tear departing from his eye and traveling down his cheek. “Please. Stay at mine tonight. Please?”

The eye contact they share now once Louis is meeting his gaze again is as sincere as ever, and it becomes clear, in every bone of Harry’s body, in the continued pressure of palm, against palm, against heartbeat, that the boy is millimeters close to breaking. Just completely cracking under everything that’s weighing on his mind. But all Harry needs right now is the confirmation—confirmation that it will be okay, at least for tonight.

Louis just nods, jaw tightening and eyes clearly displaying more of a wetness than before.

Harry nods right back, innocent, protective understanding shared between them once Harry finally releases his hand, and for _once_ , it seems, they are finally on the same page.

*:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

It’s convenient that his mother happens to be in the kitchen getting ready to whip up some brownie mix once they make it home. Definitely helps in transitioning from the quiet, albeit more understanding atmosphere of the car ride here, Harry’s mother instantly welcoming them wholeheartedly and with open arms for Louis, being dramatic and genuine about how long it’s been since she’s properly spoken to him and how he’s starting to look like a grown man already.

She _does_ ask him about the blaring black eye he has, first thing once she even gets a glimpse of him while he’s in her arms, but Louis quickly plays it off with very convincingly claiming that he “fell, or something”.

Despite the fact that Harry knows his mother doesn’t buy that for a second, she lets it slide, opting to instead caress the boy to her chest and invite him to help her make the brownie mix.

And everything just feels _easy_ for the time being.

Harry’s getting this almost nostalgic feeling, comfortably talking and teasing with Louis while they make an absolute mess of the brownie mix and his mother only half scolds them for having to open a whole new box after Harry spills everything in the first one. He experiences a flashback to so many of the nights they’ve had like this over the years; the impromptu sleepovers just _because_ , not due to Louis needing an escape from home, and not after Harry having had to literally _beg_ him. It used to be so easy, and currently, as Harry’s cursing at the boy for licking the spoon that he’s clearly using to mix the contents of the bowl with, his mind is being tricked into thinking maybe it could be easy now, too.

“Okay, just one last ingredient,” Louis declares, Harry’s mom having pretty much had her job stolen from her as she rests herself at the kitchen counter and watches them fondly.

“Yes, the cinnamon, of course,” Harry replies, sliding the bowl towards himself and swiping his finger along the side of it for a taste.

“We _always_ do cinnamon,” Louis replies, sliding the bowl back toward himself as Harry is now sucking at his own finger. “I was thinking more like, cayenne pepper, or something.”

“ _Pepper_?” Harry asks disbelievingly, already reaching for the bowl from Louis as Louis is quickly lifting it up and away, walking himself towards the pantry. “That’s gonna ruin the whole batch, idiot.”

He only barely registers his mother verbally warning him to use kind words as he’s attempting to pry the bowl away from him, all while Louis has already gotten one hand in the cabinet with the spices, struggling to reach the pepper with one arm, and firmly keeping an arm around the bowl in order to keep Harry from tugging it away.

They end up with cayenne pepper brownies, of course.

And it’s surprisingly not that bad, actually, although Harry doesn’t ever admit it once the things are finally warm enough to eat.

It’s when they’re ready to call it a night and Harry’s telling the boy that he can go up to his bedroom to change into some comfier clothes that the day is drawing to its end, Harry finding himself downstairs in the kitchen with only his mother and a steaming tray of half eaten brownies cut into squares.

The silence only lingers for a bit after Louis has gone upstairs, Harry not even realizing that he’s grinning at himself dumbly, hand gripping the edge of the counter and chin digging into his own chest.

His mom suddenly uttering the word “fell” is what brings Harry out of his own little fairy tale word, his eyes gliding over to meet his mother’s and his mind just a bit slow in realizing what she’s referring to.

“Oh, um…” Harry begins, running his palm down the back of his neck and lowering in mood once again. “It was his dad, actually.”

She nods knowingly, moving her hair behind her shoulder and seeming to grow old just thinking about it. “Figured,” she replies, her lips now holding a downward curve. She slowly gets herself up from the kitchen table, where she’d been previously watching them with adoration and laughing at their exchanges and taking a well-deserved rest. “I’ll put the brownies up. Go be with him.”

Harry doesn’t have to be told twice, simply offering his mother a goodnight kiss on the cheek and getting a ruffled up head of hair in return, and then he’s pushing himself up the stairs, only slightly curious of what direction this night may be headed in.

Louis doesn’t even notice it when Harry’s come in, since the door had been open and Harry had unknowingly been walking with light feet.

It’s an innocent sight, watching as Louis is simply stood in front of Harry’s desk mirror, all the pictures that he’s stuck into the frame of the wooden thing over the years seeming to have caught Louis’ attention. He seems particularly interested in the ones of him and Harry as his dainty fingers caress at the withered corners of some of them, Harry’s hoodie that he’s wearing giant and draping on him, zipped up to his chest.

Harry stands there like that, silent and beaming in the doorway for pretty much the maximum amount of time he can get away with it, which seems to only be thirty seconds when Louis suddenly speaks up.

“Take a picture, it’ll last longer,” he says, still facing the mirror and now poking through the staplers and trinkets and old candy on his desk without turning around to acknowledge Harry.

“Sorry,” Harry stammers under his breath, entering his own bedroom and moving to gently close the door behind himself.

“Haven’t even realized how long it’s been since I’ve actually, like…hung out in here. I even totally forgot about this creepy friendship shrine,” Louis says thoughtfully, only the desk lamp keeping the room mostly dim. “Like, I sometimes crash here and stuff, but that’s when I show up in the middle of the night and go straight to sleep, you know.”

“Or we sleep in the living room,” Harry adds, struggling with getting the safari hat off and over his head by the strap.

“Or when I leave first thing in the morning, barely even awake enough to look around me,” Louis builds on, only a hint of humor detected in his tone.

Harry even hides a tiny smirk within his shoulder at himself, walking over the area of his room and deciding that his bean bag chair looks quite comfy right about now. The breath is softly knocked out of him once he’s slumping himself into it, sunk profusely in the chair of mesh and dazedly blinking up at the ceiling.

“Dunno. Guess it’s just another one of the things that change over time,” Harry speculates, keeping his voice at peace. “Even I crash in the living room more often.”

“Which is criminal, because your bed is a feather,” Louis replies, Harry only knowing how the boy is slowly wandering around his room by the changing location of his gentle voice. “And your couch might as well be a giant brick.”

Harry shrugs, only half smirking. “I like things that have a bit of a challenge.”

Only a faint hum of amusement can be heard from Louis, right along with the hardly there pat of his socked feet against the grainy carpet of Harry’s bedroom, which eventually makes it known to Harry that the boy is approaching. He prepares himself for the way his body will eventually skyrocket in temperature and heartbeat as it happens, knowing there’s no use in fighting it.

It seems Louis makes the decision to sit himself down against the carpet right behind where Harry's slumped, it feeling as though the crown of the boy’s head is adjacent to his, the boy's back rested against the bean bag, and Harry nearly lost in this childish, giant orange thing that he’d thought was a good idea to beg for as a birthday present at some point.

When Louis’ arm is coming into view, blocking the sight Harry had previously possessed of his blank ceiling, in the boy's hand is an ancient photo of Harry held above Harry's face, throwing him off just gently. It’s an embarrassingly eccentric picture of him from eons ago, emo helmet styled hair and all, and it instantly somehow causes Harry to inwardly cringe and burst with both of his dimples simultaneously, which is obviously the reaction Louis had been going for as Harry's hearing the boy snicker uncontrollably.

“Stop, stop,” Harry cries, smacking the thing away from his face in agony and wishing he’d hidden it somewhere much better than in his desk drawer. “I thought my hair was top-tier at the time and it haunts me.”

“Thank Jesus I didn’t know you then,” Louis says, keeping his hands to himself again, Harry feeling the slight shaking as he gets out the last of his laughs.

“I’m actually gonna agree with you on that one,” Harry responds matter-of-factly. “I was still pretending to be straight and wearing Toms. Gross.”

“Oh god, Harry Styles pretending to like _girls_?” Louis says, a bit of melodrama in his tone. “I’d love to see that one.”

Harry’s lips are stretched into a lopsided grin as he responds with amusement, very much taking the piss out of this stupid, pointless back and forth. “No, no, I’d much rather continue on being gay and getting punched in the face for it than ever go back to that.”

Harry’s quickly aware of the fact that he’s sort of shifted the mood a bit with his joke that’s a little more on the darker side, mostly because it’s actually true and frightfully recent. He’s not sure if Louis cares though, but there’s a simple quietness on the other end nonetheless.

Harry can feel Louis shift upward just a bit where he sits against the ground, can barely see the sight of the boy’s crown in his peripheral if he were to turn his head towards it, practically making the both of them shoulder to shoulder, in some sense.

“You, punched by Liam Payne…” Louis speaks up, eyes up at the ceiling just like Harry. “Kind of makes sense that I got my ass kicked by my dad, then.” Louis laughs gently. “Fast acting karma.”

“Don’t,” Harry begins, letting his eyes close and his hands bunch into the beanbag material for a moment. “Don’t say that. You didn’t deserve that. No one deserves that.”

There’s more silence that follows, Harry’s brows knit and mind slowly thinking. 

“You…” Harry starts, searching for the words to use and not wanting to be unclear. “You used to kind of…live here. Not too long ago, actually. Like, you’d come over here when your father even started to irritate you just a _little_ bit, and …something like this just wouldn’t happen. You wouldn’t even be over there enough for it to happen.” Harry huffs profusely, sinking that much deeper into his chair and wanting to feel Louis just a bit more closely. “That…changed, kinda, though.”

Just slightly to the right of his own head can Harry hear the boy letting out a faint sigh, the both of them clearly in agreement that what he’s said is correct and not knowing how to go about discussing it.

“Well, some things can’t happen forever.”

“Why not?” Harry asks, a bit too fast in firing back at him, but not even wanting to leave a second to ponder what Louis could mean by that statement.

“Because, um," Louis begins, uncharacteristically fumbling over his words as they try to come out. “I—“

“I always thought we could happen forever,” Harry continues, confidently and assuredly as his determined gaze remains cast up high. “Me and you. Us. I never saw an end in sight.”

Louis doesn’t say anything, his head seeming to hang more heavily within the material of the bean bag and his lips preparing themselves but not making a sound.

Harry’s next few words come out in the form of a hush, Harry desperately not wanting to break anything within the gentle atmosphere by blurting it in the demanding, relentless way he’s been wanting to for weeks now.

“What’s happening between us.”

He can feel Louis slowly shaking his head before he opens his mouth. “If I knew, I promise I would tell you. Can’t even figure it out myself.”

And Harry doesn't know quite why, but sitting here like this, in the completely familiar and always-there environment of his bedroom, where they’d share their secrets, and their worries, and sometimes fight loudly enough for his mother to come bursting in with concern, he gets the urge to say everything. It’s as though his mouth is becoming slippery, which is astounding considering he’s completely sober.

“This is just absolutely wild to me, if I’m being honest,” Harry begins, only shifting a bit in his chair in order to sit up slightly, eyes still wondrously focused on the white nothingness up above. “Like, I’ve been in a _complete_ mindfuck since the night we kissed on the soccer field, because—even though I pride myself on not assuming people are straight by default, I just literally _never_ like…” He brings a curled fist of unsure fingers up to his face, genuinely feeling the confusion of it all starting to consume him like a whirlwind. “With you I just never…like, it didn’t even cross my mind, since you know, I’ve always let you know I’m _gay_ and I’m _loud_ about being gay—“

“I look sometimes,” Louis interrupts, his voice much lower and chilled than Harry’s impassioned one, the boy shrugging as though it’s no big deal. “Like…at other things. Never acted on it, but I definitely…acknowledge that I may be into it, I guess. Nothing drastic.”

Harry’s lowering his hands again, settling himself deeper into the beanbag gradually and urging himself to process this information, which is absolutely _mind blogging,_ by the way.

“Okay,” Harry says, mostly just clarifying with himself at this point. “So you looked. Like…at me?” He seriously cannot make himself _believe_ this after having the boy as his cooler, much better in every way, objectively gorgeous best friend for almost half a decade.

“I dunno,” Louis replies, shifting a bit. “You were always right _there_ , so.”

“This is just crazy,” Harry declares, shaking his head and squinting briefly. “It’s a slap in the face.”

“A slap in the face?”

“Yes, because I’m fucking _gay_ , you idiot!” Harry replies, the single hum from Louis showing he’s clearly finding this sudden burst entertaining. “Because I’m your best _fucking_ friend and because I’m _fucking_ gay, and therefore, we could’ve started this a much longer time ago, instead of _now_ when it’s right at the end of senior year, and it’s weird, and we don’t know if we’re even going to be within reach of each other after the summer ends, and it’s just damn emotionally inconvenient if I’m being quite honest—“

“We couldn’t have,” Louis interjects, his voice slightly raised and objecting enough for Harry to quiet, brows drawing together in only faint befuddlement.

“Whatd’you mean?”

“Like…if we’d just up and drunkenly kissed four years ago. That’d actually be worse,” Louis answers, his volume softening again. “We probably wouldn’t even be friends by sophomore year, let alone right now, sitting in this room.”

Harry’s head is shaking side to side emphatically, Louis still voicing himself more inaudibly in mutters. “I don’t believe that. I just don’t.”

“Why wouldn’t you? I mean, look what it’s doing to us now—“

Harry sighs, rolling his head around tiredly and toying with the button at his shorts, almost finding the oblivious boy behind him laughable. 

“Louis,” he sort of sighs sadly, his now closed eyes transporting him back to the beginning of high school without much effort. “The start of high school. Freshman year. I’d been friends with you for a little over six months.”

All he gets from Louis is a single sniff, and he figures it’s a surefire way to tell the boy is patient and listening.

“I’d already come out to you—first before everybody, of course, and it wasn’t like you told me you liked boys too, so I had immediately put away the idea of us _ever_ being anything other than best friends. But it was that one day, freshman year, six months into our friendship that I let myself daydream.” His eyes remain closed with a blissful air, not even sure of whether or not he’s grinning stupidly just thinking about it, how young and dumb and hopelessly romantic he was. “I let myself hyperfixate on the idea of us being together for a day, actually sort of _pretend_ you were my boyfriend for that day. Because I knew that if I were to choose who would be most ideal, it would be you, without a doubt.

“I just knew it couldn’t happen though, so that’s why I gave myself only that day; a certain amount of time where I would go back to normal and forget about it once my time was up. Forget about my stupid daydream.”

Louis’ gentle breathing can be heard once Harry’s quieting both his mouth and his breaths as well, feeling as though Louis and him are so in tune and at peace with this entire moment that they could very much float away, attached at the bean bag chair and free of the cares of the future and all of its expectations.

“Twin day,” Louis says simply, not asking, but merely confirming with Harry that that was the day he was talking about. 

Harry doesn't even know why it doesn’t astonish him, doesn’t send him into absolute shock, having the boy pinpoint the day so easily. The boy has always been years more intuitive and knowing than he lets on. 

He and the boy had been matching in clothes that day for spirit week, red plaid shirts (Louis the short sleeve and Harry the long sleeve) and dark blue jeans, practically glued at the hip because it was an activity day and they were both still in the spirit club, setting up decorations in the gym, getting excused from fourth period early in order to work on giant banners. It wasn’t really hard to pretend Louis was his that day.

Louis speaks up again amidst the tranquil, knowing moment they’re sharing, his voice small and questioning in a way that almost goes unheard.

“Did you?” he asks, silence stretching for a bit and Harry contemplating the interrogative. “Like after…did you let it go.”

Harry clears his throat in response, his eyes slipping shut only momentarily and the innards of his stomach faintly beginning to churn out of how raw and just _honest_ everything between them is becoming right now. It’s as though their entire friendship is being done apart from head to toe, exposed for everything hidden that’d been lying underneath it, destined to come to light at some point.

“I thought I did,” Harry answers after a while, the tension in his body releasing just in time with his words. “Actually, I was absolutely _certain_ I did, until we kissed. And then we had sex. And then I see you making out with Jas, who I’ve seen you make out with before and didn’t think much of, but this time around it made me want to claw my eyes out. So yeah, I definitely can’t say that I'm currently in the, um...mental place of having 'let it go'.”

“I’m,” Louis sighs, taking a moment. “I’m sorry about that. By the way. Jas wanted to, and so I just...did.”

Harry can’t help the immediate way he yearns for a more explicit answer, because right now everything is flowing and the jump-to-conclusion etiquette of his mind can’t do well with the vague implicitness.

"You just did?" He tries to find a balance between keeping the question lighthearted and somewhat jokey, but also making it clear he needs more explanation than that.

Suddenly Harry can feel the boy sitting up, much more upright than he’s been for this entire conversation, since Harry can’t even see him in his peripheral anymore and he very well may be all the way sat up, elbows rested on his knees, and his eyes not gazing up high along with Harry like moments before.

“C’mon, Haz,” Louis mutters, the smirk heard in his voice. “I know I’m not the first cliché, confused, frustrating boy you’ve had to deal with. I’m just a—a fucking broken record player, a poster boy for toxic so-called straight men, and I really don’t want to put you through anything that comes with that.”

Harry’s moving position where he sits too, flipping himself over within the beanbag chair and letting his elbows hold most of his weight as he now finds himself facing Louis' back and much lower in position than the boy, his mouth already wide open and prepared to protest—Louis beats him to it though.

“I’m fucking losing my mind,” Louis continues, head downcast and words just the same. “About… _this_. About the fact that, like—“ Harry can hear him messing around with his fingers, probably twiddling with them in that way he does when he’s about to dig just a little deeper into a hidden part of himself in order to bring new things to the surface. “Like, I can’t even fucking imagine being without you in any sense. I got this—this fucking dumb summer scholarship thing that I'd really wanted so bad and the most that I can think about is how it's going to force me to face that fear much sooner, which terrifies me. And yeah, that’s a best friend thing, but also, now I kinda wanna rip your clothes off every time I see you too, and those two things together…Jesus. It’s just…a lot.”

“How is this bad again?” Harry asks, the humor clear in his tone and immediately bringing Louis to glance at the boy behind him, both of them now bearing a glimmer of tease in their eyes as Harry remains way below and Louis remains sat up, way too far away.

Harry's honestly doing a good job of keeping somewhat of a poker face right now, since the fleeting mention of this summer scholarship thing is something he has _never_ heard before, and inside his mind he's so fucking ecstatic about it and wants to hug the life out of him for actually _going_ for it and looking for a way out of his abusive home, especially since Harry's always thought he was such a gifted boy destined for greatness, but on the outside he's chill about it, not wanting Louis to retreat in any way.

Louis swiftly fixes the unnecessary distance between them, the boy tucking his knees up under himself and turning towards Harry, still an inch or two higher than the boy in level since Harry's profusely slumped down low in the beanbag chair, but Harry not caring because he’s quite fond of having to turn up his chin to look at the boy.

“What's the matter with you?” Louis asks, voice low. “I _just_ explained how it's bad.”

“Well um…” Harry begins, right dimple deepening as his fingers reach out to tap at Louis’ knee. “You kind of sidetracked me with the ‘rip my clothes off’ part. I didn’t know it was that, erm—” He clears his throat, really not wanting another one of his flustered stuttering episodes to start up right now, even though everything is pointing to it as his chest tightens up and his eyes can only focus on Louis’ lips. “I didn’t know I was that irresistible to you.”

The words seem to poke at some deeply embedded flame within Louis, the boy's eyes suddenly less wandering and unfocused and now delicately sliding down the features of Harry's face, lidded and almost sleepy-looking. It's as though something has come over him as Harry just watches the switch, admiring the way his teeth sink into his bottom lip in such a subtle way that Harry's only able to see because of how close they are, the way his hands curl into fists at his own thighs, as though there's this silent something that he's desperate to release.

“Trust me…you _are_ , Harry Styles,” Louis whispers, seeming to get lost in it as his forehead comes down closer, lashes cascading his cheeks as his gaze is steadied toward Harry’s lips, both of them completely disregarding each other’s eyes. “And now, I'm...I'm _obsessed_ with watching you…and God, _hearing_ you…and touching you everywhere…”

“Go ahead, you have my full permission,” Harry breathes hotly, his eyes fully closed and his body dead set on attaching his lips to Louis’, although it's severely frustrating that it doesn’t seem to happen when they both get so many chances for it to. It’s as though Louis is attempting to stop himself mentally, but his body's still bringing him just close enough to tease and drive Harry insane.

Harry opens his eyes to mere slits after a while of forehead touching and burning energy circulating between them, albeit no joined lips, which is what sends Harry’s frustration nearly through the roof. When all he finds is Louis still so close, his eyes closed as well and his head shaking side to side faintly with disapproval, he furrows his own brows.

“Can’t,” Louis whispers, Harry now having gently gripped his knee. 

“Can,” Harry replies matter-of-factly as he nods, their foreheads pressing flush together once he leans forth a bit more. “Because guess what? I already love you. I say it all the time. Getting started with me is sort of like a satisfaction guarantee.”

They both burst into tiny little innocent bouts of laughter, Harry feeling his dimples on both sides absolutely swooning the sight of Louis’ genuine full-toothed smile, and then it seems Louis swiftly makes the decision for himself and caresses Harry by the jaw in order to cut his little giggle short.

And Harry falls into it, lets Louis take the lead and makes himself as complaisant as ever, his bedroom silent and comforting all around him and his lips finding a home right in between Louis’.

Harry doesn’t even have to put in much effort in pressing his lips up against Louis or reaching for him wherever he can touch because Louis is taking full control of most of it within quite a short amount of time, the boy fully leaned over Harry and making his head tilt backwards dizzily as he grips him firmly by the jaw with one hand and devours his lips with his, Harry only remembering to breathe when his own nose does so roughly.

Only a brief break happens in their impassioned lip-locking, Louis’ stuttered breaths of what seems like chuckles (Harry’s eyes still closed and mind still too entranced to check), the boy mumbling the words “satisfaction guarantee” before going back in to catch a corner of his lips, a steaming, wet kiss placed there that is only the first of many ones that proceed to move toward his jaw and down his neck.

Everything is happening on sort of a cloud right now, because Harry’s mildly experiencing euphoria once Louis is simply laid out on his _own_ bed for him, he himself going over to lock the handle on his bedroom door and walking his way over to his bed as well. Just the pure way Louis’ hungry, lidded eyes don’t ever leave his on the journey there, although surveying his body once Harry’s entering the bed on his knees, has Harry dangerously close to buckling.

It just becomes fun, and hot, and intimate, and just pretty much fucking _everything_ Harry always thought he’d experience with the perfect guy in bed, the both of them nearly catlike as they roll over each other in regards to who gets to take the top position, Harry already having his idea of how _he_ would utilize the top position, but Louis surely thinking he has an even better idea, which is why Harry finds himself down on his back after a long period of laughing with their noses attached, shoving one another down, and failed pinning of each other’s arms.

Within the clouded, hazy lust of everything, Harry can definitely remember telling the boy to “rip my clothes off like you said you wanted to” at some point, a new person most certainly having completely consumed him as the boy is looming over him like this, hypnotizing eyes surveying every detail of his face and sure hands still having Harry pinned at both wrists.

And so Louis does exactly as he asks, actually _ripping_ the material of this Hawaiian shirt that Harry had literally bought just last week, and it’s quite funny for half a moment, the fact that it’s so difficult to get off for a long amount of trying at first.

Harry’s still got the shredded, cheap material cascaded across his mostly bare chest, only two buttons still done up near his stomach when Louis’ gotten Harry’s shorts down and is palming him through his briefs, one hand coaxing him softly while his mouth sucks at the boy's neck so deeply that Harry’s almost tingling with it.

How in the world is he supposed to give this up? How on _earth_ is this supposed to be wrong, the fact that he’s finally found someone—someone who was right under his _nose_ —who he clicks with on every emotional, sexual, and romantic (okay maybe he’s reaching but we’re getting there) level? This is actually something that Harry will never experience again if he doesn’t take a hold of it right _now_.

Harry’s never really classified himself as submissive, more like flustered and seemingly timid when things are getting started but quickly showing exactly who the fuck he is once they’re in the swing of things, but submissive is all that he can be once Louis' holding him down to the bed by his neck, a hand having gotten right around his wet dick long ago and the boy not even starting off with slow, inviting jerks of his hand, instead just going straight for speedy and purposeful.

Like, he doesn't even know if Louis _likes_ choking him. He does it because he knows Harry's into it, and the thought alone has Harry bucking up into Louis’ hand some more, hands out upon the ruffled sheets on either side of him and grasping onto whatever they can hold.

Louis’ hand seems to dip further into his neck the closer Harry is to coming, the boy just seeming to take pleasure in watching it, Harry struggling between opening his glossy eyes to see the way the boy is awestruck and slack watching him, or squeezing them shut and arching into every relentless pull the boy is giving him.

Harry’s never been good at staying quiet, and it’s always been sort of uncontrollable for him and occasionally embarrassing when he thinks back on certain instances, but in the moment, it’s never something he can stress about, which is why his jaw is soon dropped, Louis’ hand moving upward just a little to instead grip up under his chin, index finger inside of his mouth that Harry bites down on at the same time that he bursts with an almost pained sounding, silent-breaking whimper.

“Wanna feel you,” Harry breathes, eyes still closed, but hands blindly reaching for the front of Louis’ pants, fingers only twitching in pleasure twice as they reach.

Louis seems to slow down a bit, most likely because he probably wants to look into what Harry wants, but Harry doesn’t let it deter him, simply shifting himself closer to Louis so that their hips are flush and sitting himself up at the same time as he opens his eyes. He curls his fingers up under the grainy shirt the boy still has on, Louis calmly allowing it and getting the thing pulled off from over his head, leaving his hair wildly messy and devastatingly sexy like this.

So here they remain, Harry almost bare in the chest as his shirt is mostly useless and nonexistent, and Louis exposed with his hot, scalding body that Harry’s just now realized he’s never seen intimately, up close, and in good lighting, Harry running his hands down the warm sides of his torso whilst the alarm clock on his dresser beeps twice to signify the beginning of a new hour. 

And then he refocuses on what he’d initially wanted, his hands supremely fast as he’s toying with Louis’ pants and hinting to him that they should come down, getting himself laid on his back again and budging Louis in a position where they’re in a perfect place for frotting. Louis probably doesn’t even know what frotting is, the poor, poor boy.

That is, until he gets the hang of it within seconds, and all Harry can feel is the heated, ferociously personal sensation of Louis’ length pulsating against his whilst the boy grips them both together as tightly as he can, now looming over him with one hand in between them and one hand braced against the headboard of the bed, all eyes on how Harry’s taking this.

Everything grows slippery, sweaty, and glistening in fervor from that point on, the both of them outrageously slick enough to allow them to slide easily and warmly against each other, Harry’s eyes long closed and his hands fisting the sheets as he bucks up against it with no sense of control. 

“ _Jes—“_ Harry finds himself panting, one hand scrambling up to caress the side of Louis’ face as he sits himself up a bit, now pretty much riding the rising wave he's experiencing. “Oh my god.”

Their breaths kind of begin to fall in line with one another, every hot pant that Louis takes filling the air between their mouths, happening just in time with Harry's warm heaves, all in tune with their lengths flush against each other in a way that’s almost too much.

And he also just loves the way Louis is quieter than him by miles, the way his little sounds and whimpers and moans are choked into his throat or whispered out in that specific way, his intense gaze into Harry’s very soul doing most of the talking and the increased speed of his own thrust showing just how much he wants it.

“ _Fuck_ ,” Harry breathes, letting himself back down against the bed again and curving his back as he feels his body beginning to heat up for what’s coming. “ _I’m—fuck—“_

“Come on,” he suddenly _feels_ rather than hears, the boy above him breathing hotly into his ear and securing a tight hand around the front of Harry’s neck again.

Harry can’t even nod, can’t form words—all he can do is fist the sheets in that way he’s always known himself to do, thighs unknowingly cementing Louis close in and fingertips almost going numb with his everlasting grip on the bed material. Although he can’t form words, his _noises_ are at an all time high right now as Louis is pretty much both jerking them _and_ thrusting his length into Harry’s at double the speed, and as soon as Harry’s wide open mouth has let out one of those screams he couldn’t control even if he tried, Louis is slapping a hand over his mouth, nearly cutting off his main source of air while still going at him with the same speed and passion.

Louis’ sweaty palm over his mouth doesn’t do much for keeping Harry quiet, however, Harry’s pleasured groans and breathless uncontrollable exclamations now just muffled as his brows crinkle together and he meets Louis right at the climax, the both of them riding it out like insatiable bunnies as their hips move erratically. It’s hard to discern anything that’s going on, both with himself and the person in front of him when he’s coming this hard, but one thing he knows for sure is that the boy’s name flies out of his mouth a couple of times—well, as much as it's able to with the boy still holding a hand to his face to keep him quiet.

The way they come down from it together is intense, the both of them worn out past a point of doing anything else but still using enough energy to catch each other at their foreheads, heaving, exhausted breaths and kinetic energy in between them. They just sort of follow each other for a moment, just like before in the beanbag chair when they’d gotten started with this whole thing, the backs of Louis’ fingers stroking up and down Harry’s arms and getting him to feel again, and Harry running his fingertips down the boy’s chest with an innocent curiosity.

And then he’s reaching up toward the back of the boy’s neck and kissing him, lazily, tiredly, but with clear intent, mostly in the way he lets himself lay back fully against the bed, making Louis to come down with him.

He slightly shudders at the vague feeling of Louis' length still against him, the boy shifting his hips upward a bit in a way that Harry’s body is definitely not prepared for at this current moment in time, but it seems it was just a mere happening, the both of them more engulfed in languidly locking their lips and dancing their tongues over one another to be cautious of their still close and personal dicks.

They end up kissing a lot, Harry only wishing he’d kept track of exactly how long it goes on when it’s over, and he’s actually getting a kiss on his _nose_ as they both die down in energy.

And it all just…feels real.

Like he doesn’t have to set aside one day in order to pretend, and obsess, and daydream, because it’s all real, and Louis’ actually everything he’s always wanted, and they’re _doing_ this right now.

But, that’s just how it _feels_. And Harry really shouldn’t be considered a good judge of anything due to his post-coital euphoric state right now.

Which is why he hopes Louis doesn’t make a big deal out of the fact that tears begin to form in his own eyes—long after he’s come so he can’t use it as an excuse later on, unfortunately. It actually would’ve gone fully unnoticed had Harry not sniffled only once, but once Louis’ slit, sleepy eyes open just to see his face, all he does in response is get his arms around the boy, Harry finding his nose pressed against Louis' chest in an instant and simply letting his arms wrap around the boy’s waist too, not seeing any reason in fighting it.

They remain like that for a while, cuddled around each other warmly, although eventually Louis ends up more positioned on his back and Harry ends up close in next to him, still hugging him tightly against himself and receiving the same wordless, assuring hug in response as his face is buried well within the man’s neck.

Harry speaks up after a while of wholly comfortable silence, his lips fluttering against the boy’s skin and his words softly mumbled.

“You know you’re my dream boy, right?” he asks, only raising his voice enough for Louis to hear right against his ear, and no one else. Not even if someone was standing right by the bed. “Like…this is my dream scenario.”

All Louis does is blow air out of his mouth drowsily, just as Harry would expect him to, only leaving Harry to cling onto him just as tightly and feel gratified that he’d said what was on his mind.

“You saying all this stupid shit is doing nothing but making me sink deeper,” Louis replies quietly.

Harry picks his head up, chin now rested in Louis’ chest and their eyes gazing at each other within close range. “Deeper into what?”

Louis doesn’t hesitate to answer, his forehead nudging towards Harry’s briefly as he says it. “Into _you_.” The tiny grin of flush that pokes at Harry’s cheeks in response is something he can’t control, even more so when Louis reaches out a finger to poke at Harry’s dimple and adds “into _those_.” 

And now Harry _especially_ can't stop the little bubbles of giggles he's blowing into the air close between them.

“Stop, please,” Louis’ groaning as he lays his head back, voice toneless and eyes falling closed in reaction to Harry’s dumb grin nearly splitting his own face in half.

“I can’t,” Harry sighs, letting his head fall as well and taking his place back in the crook of the boy’s neck. “I can’t stop with you.”

He falls and rises with Louis’ breaths going in and out, his arm draped across the boy’s chest as he hugs him more loosely and the warmth of the boy’s fingertips is still teasing at his waist where Louis keeps him snuggled in close. Harry lets the silence stretch, a more whispered, passionate energy coming over him as they lay there in perfect harmony and everything just feels _right_ , as though this is what they’ve been building up to from the moment they’d introduced themselves to each other four years ago during that lame student shuffle ice breaker game in spirit club.

“Just…” Harry starts, now fully whispering and afraid to break the peace. “Give this a chance. Please.” He lets his arm stretch across the boy to hug him more fully again at the last word, pressing himself that much closer into him and hoping it will aid him in making the right decision—or at least, the one that Harry definitely wants to gamble on.

All Louis does is make his hand more flush against his waist, pulling Harry in closer than he’d already been, and leaving Harry to look for the answer in that. But Harry doesn’t really know what to think. Any terrified guy would be putting back on his clothes, shoving his shoes on and declaring he has somewhere to be after getting what they'd wanted (Harry has literally had it happen to him before okay), but here Louis is, pulling him in closer and not shutting him down.

So maybe they have a chance. Maybe.

And with that, Harry lets his eyes float to closed lids, using mostly the warmth of Louis to lull him into a sleep that’s near that of a baby.

He even dreams about him too.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> next chapter is the last chapter :)


End file.
